Signal · Where battery-grade lithium comes fromPrepared for The Heritage Group · September 2026
Cirba's own route is the fastest-improving way to get lithium. Faster than digging it out of the ground.
Europe requires 50% of lithium to be recovered from waste batteries by the end of 2027 and 80% by the end of 2031, with 6% recycled lithium in new batteries from 2031. Your feedstock is shifting toward cheaper chemistries at the same time. So the question is which recovery route carries the target. Here is every source of battery-grade lithium on one chart, mining included.
Fourteen routes to battery-grade lithium, mining included · the recovery half read from the platform export
The decision
Whether the Ohio flowsheet carries the lithium target · what to build next, and what to buy
The clock
50% lithium recovered by end 2027 · 80% by end 2031 · 6% recycled content from 2031
The map
The recovery half of the chart: five routes from waste batteries, measured on maturity and improvement rate.
The high/low TIR bands split on the median improvement rate of these five recovery routes (108.4%/yr) — a judgement relative to this domain, not a fixed threshold; black mass sits exactly on it. The maturity split is TRL 5, the end of validation in a relevant environment. This chart is the recovery half of the full fourteen-route lithium picture; the mining routes are not in this export. Source: GetFocus platform export · September 2026.
What the signal shows
The whole chart2× → 4×
Recovery beats extraction, and the gap is widening.
In 2017 recycling improved about twice as fast as mining. Today it is four times. Your own route is the fastest thing here, and the only one at that speed already running at full size.
Lithium first, not last32 → 439
Pulling lithium out first has tripled since 2017.
Filings on it went from 32 a year to 439. It is second fastest on the chart, and it is already out of the lab. Your flowsheet takes lithium last, after nickel and cobalt. The 50% and 80% targets are about lithium, so the order matters.
Your competition14 of 14
The smelters are the slowest route on the chart.
Smelting is bottom of all fourteen. Lithium goes into the slag, so it cannot meet a 50% lithium target without changing. The route that suits your changing feedstock has tripled its filings. It beats every mining route except the ones still in the lab.
Who holds the patents
Patent families per route — and each route’s biggest holder.
Source: GetFocus platform export · September 2026
The orange bars are Cirba’s routes — black mass is the biggest filing base in recovery and hydromet the fastest-improving. The universities and CATL crowd the top of the holder lists; the smelters’ 489 families are led by Sumitomo Metal Mining, and lithium-first has tripled its yearly filings since 2017.
For Heritage
The owner-level case is stronger than the market thinks. Recycled lithium is improving faster than mined lithium, the gap has widened every year since 2017, and Cirba is on the fastest route of the fourteen. Two things to watch. Taking lithium out first, rather than last, is the fastest-growing idea in recovery and it is not how the Ohio flowsheet runs. And the route that suits your changing feedstock is moving fast but is still early, so it is something to build, not something to buy.
The method, in one minute
What is TIR?
TIR — the Technology Improvement Rate — measures how fast a technology gets better each year, computed from global patent data. Not who is filing, or how much: how fast the route is actually moving. Historically, the fastest-improving technology always wins.
Signal 1 · Cycle time
How many years between one generation of inventions and the next.
Methodology co-developed with MIT — 30 years of peer-reviewed research.
What we could look into next
Three questions this teaser opened.
01
Lithium first
Who is filing on it, how much lithium do they claim to recover, and on which feedstock?
02
Cheaper cathodes
Your mix is shifting. Which route pays when there is no cobalt to sell?
03
The sorbent makers
Brine companies are entering recovery. Are they suppliers or competitors?
Pick one, or choose a new topic. We run it as a full proof of concept for you, at no cost.
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Map who is filing on lithium-first and on which feedstock, test which route pays when there is no cobalt to sell, or read whether the brine sorbent makers are suppliers or competitors — we run any one as a full proof of concept, at no cost, walked through with our analysts.
