The lithium battery market in Chile

According to the Ministry of the Environment, Chile will generate about 1,100 t of lithium-ion battery waste and 44,400 t of lead-acid battery waste in 2026, and almost none of the lithium-ion stream is recycled inside the country. Chile’s Extended Producer Responsibility law (Ley REP, Law No. 20,920) is in force, but battery targets will be set by a decree the Ministry of the Environment must propose before 2027-01-29.

Updated October 9, 2026 · Reviewed by the EcoBaterías technical team.

• 1,100 testimated lithium-ion battery waste in Chile for 2026
• 44,400 testimated lead-acid battery waste for 2026
• ≈0%of lithium-ion batteries are recycled in Chile today
• 2027-01-29deadline for the Ministry of the Environment to propose the battery decree

Source: impact assessment of the draft battery decree, Ministry of the Environment (Res. Ex. 821/2026) (opens in a new tab) · 2026-09-18

Source: DS 22/2025, Ministry of the Environment, Official Gazette (opens in a new tab) and draft battery decree, Ministry of the Environment (Res. Ex. 821/2026) (opens in a new tab) · 2026-09-18

What is on the Chilean market today

Market size is not measured by what gets recycled, but by what comes in. The impact assessment of the draft decree estimates how many units entered the Chilean market in 2026 and how much waste those units generate once they leave service. The gap between the two is what defines the management business.

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Source: impact assessment of the draft battery decree, Ministry of the Environment (Res. Ex. 821/2026) (opens in a new tab) · 2026-09-18

The two streams behave in opposite ways. Lead-acid is huge in tonnage and already has a mature recycling chain driven by the value of lead. Lithium-ion is about 40 times smaller in tonnage, grows with electromobility and storage, and is barely valorized inside Chile. If what you need is the drop-off point, see where to recycle lithium batteries in Chile.

How much will reach end of life

The lithium-ion stream grows with electromobility and storage. This is our estimate of the lithium batteries that will reach end of life in Chile:

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Source: EcoBaterías in-house estimate, not a declared figure · 2026-10-06

The cobalt sulfate market

Copper mining uses cobalt sulfate in electrowinning and imports it: 60 to 80% comes from China (Chilean Customs Service). Between January and August 2026 the price per kilo almost doubled as cobalt rose. That is the market for the product recovered from recycling phone and laptop batteries.

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Source: Chilean Customs Service (Servicio Nacional de Aduanas) (opens in a new tab), imports under tariff line 2833.29.10, excluding laboratory lots · 2026-10-06

Two decrees, two calendars

The most frequent confusion in compliance meetings is mixing the DS 22/2025 targets with the ones proposed in the draft battery decree. They are two separate instruments with different legal status, and they are best read apart. The full picture is in our pillar page on Chile’s EPR law and batteries: what applies today and what is coming.

Legal status of table A: DS 22/2025 was published in the Official Gazette on 2026-05-07 and its targets become enforceable 24 months after publication, that is, from May 2028.

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Source: DS 22/2025, Ministry of the Environment, Official Gazette (opens in a new tab) · 2026-09-18

The photovoltaic rule has a feature that changes planning: the target is measured against the estimated waste of the year, not against what was placed on the market. The detail of that calculation is in DS 22/2025 applied to solar panels.

Legal status of table B as of 2026-09-19: Law No. 20,920 is in force, but the battery targets are not. They come from the draft decree approved by Res. Ex. 821/2026 (2026-02-16), open for public consultation from 25-02 to 2026-04-09 with 451 comments and 33 international queries; the deadline was extended by Res. Ex. 4,225/2026 (2026-07-29) to 2027-01-29. The figures may change during the process: the valid reference will be the published decree.

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Source: draft battery decree, Ministry of the Environment (Res. Ex. 821/2026) (opens in a new tab) · 2026-09-18

The proposed scope is set in Art. 2 No. 1: batteries of 5 kg or more, plus every lead-acid battery regardless of weight. Anything under 5 kg that is not lead-acid is treated as a portable battery and therefore falls under DS 22/2025.

Who is obliged, and to what

The primary obligated party is the producer: whoever manufactures in Chile or is the first to import the product. A mining site, a bus fleet or a solar plant that imports its own equipment is the producer of those units even if it never sells them. Around that figure, the draft decree assigns concrete duties.

1. Retailers with more than 400 m² of floor area (Art. 26). They must accept from the public the battery types they sell, without requiring a new purchase.
2. Vehicle workshops (Art. 29). Collective management systems must collect from them the batteries removed from vehicles, and the draft creates a free registry of workshops.
3. Industrial consumers and storage sites above 1 MWh (Art. 40). They must report annually, before 31 May, through the single window of Chile’s pollutant release and transfer register (RETC).
4. Territorial coverage (Art. 28). The draft proposes a minimum network of drop-off points based on the population of each municipality.

Art. 5 proposes two exemptions: micro-enterprises under Law No. 20,416 and anyone placing less than 600 kg per year on the market. Being exempt from the targets does not exempt anyone from handling hazardous waste properly: for that you need an authorized lithium battery waste manager with a verifiable final destination.

Demand for testing and second life

The clause that matters most for lithium-ion is not the collection percentage but the preparation-for-reuse fraction: at least 30% of the target must be met that way. In operational terms, a pack cannot go straight to the shredder without being tested first.

That turns testing and reuse into part of compliance rather than an add-on: lithium battery testing, repair and pack refurbishment, second-life batteries for stationary storage and, for panels, testing and reuse of used modules. Every unit returned to service counts against the target and avoids the cost of treating a waste.

All of those services are available, as is pickup coordinated with licensed hazardous-waste carriers. Recycling and final disposal go through authorized receiving facilities; own capacity is in the permitting process with the Seremi de Salud RM (Chile’s regional health authority). The full overview is under services for lithium batteries and solar panels.

The other stream: an aging solar fleet

The market covered by Law No. 20,920 is not limited to batteries. The EcoBaterías Solar Observatory analyzed 756 photovoltaic plants in operation in Chile, with 12,884 MW of nominal capacity and roughly 34.9 million installed modules, representing close to 1.0 million tonnes of material at the end of its useful life.

The flow does not arrive all at once. Between now and 2029 the expected trickle is 55,000 to 80,000 modules per year, almost all breakage and replacement; the peaks come in the years when power purchase agreements expire, at 400,000 to 850,000 modules per year. The operational route for that material is in solar panel recycling in Chile.

Source: EcoBaterías Solar Observatory, cut-off 2026-09-11 · EcoBaterías’ own estimate.

How material and value move

The full cycle has four legs, and in each one it changes who pays and who collects. Understanding it avoids the most common surprise: waste is a cost until someone turns it into mineral.

1. Producers and importers. Law No. 20,920 assigns them responsibility for the product at the end of its life and obliges them to fund its collection and valorization.
2. Collection and traceability. An end-of-life battery is handled as hazardous waste under Supreme Decree (DS) 148 unless a characterization shows otherwise: it moves with licensed transport and is documented batch by batch.
3. Valorization at the plant. At a hydrometallurgical plant the battery is dismantled, milled and processed into mineral product with commercial specification. It is the hydrometallurgical process that EcoMinería (Ecoprojects), a founding partner of EcoBaterías, ran at its Lampa plant, and the process of the new EcoBaterías plant, under review by the Seremi de Salud RM.
4. Back to mining and industry. Recovered cobalt and nickel sulfate, copper and aluminum return to the sector that needs them, without leaving the country.

That last leg is what makes the difference against exporting the battery or its black mass: by completing valorization inside Chile, what is shipped are products, not waste. The arithmetic of that difference is in the Basel Convention advantage, and the business model figures are in the investor information.

Frequently asked questions

How many tonnes of end-of-life batteries does Chile generate?

The economic and social impact assessment of the draft battery decree estimates 1,100 t of lithium-ion battery waste and 44,400 t of lead-acid battery waste for Chile in 2026. The two streams behave very differently: lead-acid already has a mature recycling chain, while lithium-ion is barely recycled inside the country.

Are there binding collection targets for lithium batteries yet?

No. Chile's Extended Producer Responsibility law (Ley REP, Law No. 20,920) is in force, but battery targets will be set by a decree still under preparation: the Ministry of the Environment has until 2027-01-29 to propose it. Batteries under 5 kg, electrical and electronic equipment and photovoltaic modules do have their own targets under Supreme Decree (DS) 22/2025.

What does the law already require from a company storing end-of-life batteries?

It must handle them as hazardous waste: safe storage for a limited time, delivery to a manager holding a health authorization for that waste, licensed hazardous-waste carriers, and documented evidence of the final destination of every batch.

Why does the draft decree single out batteries of 5 kg or more?

Because the weight threshold separates two different logistics chains. Below 5 kg the stream is domestic and is collected at retailers and drop-off points; above 5 kg it is industrial and moves with dispatch notes, batch weighing and licensed transport. Lead-acid batteries are covered regardless of weight.

How much of the future demand comes from testing and reuse?

The draft decree proposes that at least 30% of the lithium-ion target be met through preparation for reuse. That forces packs to be tested before they are shredded and turns diagnostics, repair and second life into part of compliance rather than a separate service.

Sources

• Library of the National Congress of Chile, Law No. 20,920 on waste management and extended producer responsibility (opens in a new tab).
• Ministry of the Environment, DS 22/2025, published in the Official Gazette (opens in a new tab) on 2026-05-07.
• Ministry of the Environment, draft supreme decree on batteries and its impact assessment (Res. Ex. 821/2026) (opens in a new tab), with the deadline extension of Res. Ex. 4,225/2026.
• Sanitary regulation on hazardous waste management, Supreme Decree (DS) 148/2003, Ministry of Health.
• EcoBaterías Solar Observatory, cut-off 2026-09-11: universe of photovoltaic plants, installed capacity and projection of modules reaching end of life.
• Publishable figures and their attribution: datos/estadisticas.json by EcoBaterías, cut-off 2026-09-18.