Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change notified the Battery Waste Management (BWM) Rules, 2022 on 22nd August 2022, along with amendments thereof, applicable to producers, dealers, consumers, and entities involved in collection, segregation, transportation, refurbishment, and recycling of waste batteries across chemistries. As per Rule 11(17) of the BWM Rules, 2022, the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) is required to issue guidelines for environmentally sound procedures for recycling of Waste Battery. These Guidelines have been prepared for environmentally sound management and recycling of Waste Battery in accordance with the BWM Rules, 2022.

The Guidelines cover recycling of Waste Lead Acid Batteries and Waste Lithium-ion Batteries.

For Waste Lead Acid Batteries, the Guidelines specify: an indicative list of facilities required, including type of furnace (Rotary/Mandir Bhatti/Refining Alloy Kettle) with Air Pollution Control Systems, stack height of minimum 30 metres, battery-breaking process requirements (manual and mechanical), timelines for installation of mechanical/automated battery-breaking systems (within one year for facilities above 5,000 MTA capacity and within three years for facilities below 5,000 MTA), Effluent Treatment Plant requirements, and PPE requirements; emission/discharge standards for lead, including limits for work area (0.05 mg/m³ NIOSH 8-hr avg.), stack emissions (10.0 mg/Nm³), effluents (0.10 mg/l), factory premises near boundary wall (1.0 μg/m³ 24-hr avg.), and worker blood lead level monitoring with a threshold of 42 μg/dl for relocation to non-lead activity areas; and steps to minimize fugitive lead emissions.

For Waste Lithium-ion Batteries, the Guidelines specify: an indicative list of facilities required for shredding and hydro-metallurgical processing, categorized by recycler type (R2, R3, R4) as defined under the BWM Rules, 2022; steps involved in hydro-metallurgical processing, including discharging, shredding, black mass separation, leaching, filtration, and solvent extraction to recover manganese, cobalt, nickel, and lithium; guidelines for dismantling of waste lithium-ion batteries, including discharge, voltage and temperature measurement requirements; guidelines for processing of waste battery for recovery of metals/metal salts; and emission standards for source emissions (including Particulate Matter at 50 mg/Nm³, Manganese at 5 mg/Nm³, Sulphuric acid mist at 50 mg/Nm³, Total Fluoride at 25 mg/Nm³, Hydrogen Fluoride at 4 mg/Nm³, and TOC at 20 mg/Nm³) and work zone emissions, with monitoring to be conducted quarterly in the first year and at least annually thereafter by ISO 17025 accredited or EPA 1986-approved laboratories.

The Guidelines further specify requirements for records and returns filing on the online EPR portal for Battery Waste Management, including generation and transfer of EPR certificates and submission of quarterly returns. Actions in case of violations of the Guidelines will be taken in accordance with the Guidelines for Environment Compensation under the BWM Rules, 2022, published in September 2024. The Guidelines state they apply in addition to the Guidelines for Utilization of Black Mass published in January 2025 and the Standard Operating Procedure for Recycling of Lead Scrap/Used Lead Acid Batteries published in January 2024. The document includes Annexure-I depicting the Lithium-ion battery Hydrometallurgical recycling process.