How the digital battery passport works

From 2027, European regulations will make the digital passport mandatory for almost all electric vehicle batteries:more attention to the environment and human rights.

Tracking information relating to car batteries is now possible.Last May it was presented at the Hannover fair the first digital battery passport:an electronic document where all the sensitive information on vehicle batteries is brought together exactly as required by the new one EU regulation 2023/1542 which regulates the information that batteries must contain within the European Union.

The law provides, in fact, that from February 2027 all electric vehicle batteries, two-wheeler batteries and industrial batteries with a capacity greater than 2 kWh they must have a digital passport.This is a great success for the sector and a step forward towards achieving the objectives of energy transition.Knowing the history of a battery is essential to have more awareness about it climate impact and on his disposal.

The life cycle of the battery

The digital passport will allow you to track almost all the information relating to life cycle of a battery.The set of information collected on the batteries is collected step by step throughout the value chain by the actors who are part of it, so as to make more transparent the whole process.Specifically, the document will contain all the data relating to the composition of the battery, the list of materials used, the maintenance operations to be carried out, the disposal methods, the details relating to the quantity of Co2 generated and the information regarding it the treatment and recovery processes.Almost all data will be public, but some will only be visible to regulators.

Single battery register

It will be fundamental to guarantee an adequate information control system.For these reasons the European Union has decided to develop a unique electronic battery register where all digital passports will be inserted.In fact, it is not easy to ensure monitoring of the supply chain.They exist the supervisory authorities of the market but these do not always manage to ensure that the exchange of information between all the players in the supply chain occurs in a transparent and appropriate manner.They need to intervene the consortia to make the information flow from the supply process to the disposal process easier.Furthermore, it is fundamental that the national authorities carry out random checks to regularly verify compliance with the parameters imposed by the European Union.

Human rights and sustainability

In addition to the technical-material aspects, the digital battery passport also aims to verify that working conditions along the supply chain are adequate.According to the data Unicef, in fact, only in Congo in 2014 they were about 40 thousand the underage boys who worked in the mines of cobalt, a fundamental material for the production of batteries in lithium rechargeable.In these areas children work on average 12 hours a day, without any insurance and with starvation wages.This is a phenomenon well known to the institutions and the European Union and now we are trying to contain it with a system that requires companies in the supply chain to give an account to the institutions all the work done to produce a battery.It cannot yet be said with certainty whether the passport will prove to be an adequate tool.However, it can be said that from the point of view of sustainability progress has been made.