Independent Director, Tesla
Search every verified Jeffrey Straubel interview, podcast appearance, and on-the-record quote — each transcript cross-checked by AI and human review to confirm speaker identity. JB Straubel, co-founder of Tesla and CEO of Redwood Materials, has been active in public discussions about battery recycling, domestic supply chains, and energy storage. In May 2025, speaking at the MIT Initiative for New Manufacturing Symposium, Straubel described Redwood Materials' mission to create a circular economy for lithium-ion batteries, stating that the company recycles approximately 70 to 75% of all lithium-ion batteries in the U.S. and is the second largest supplier of nickel and lithium from recycled materials in the country. He emphasized the technical challenge of scaling recycling processes to match the rapid growth of battery waste, noting that the company receives "20 truckloads of these things showing up every day and that's accelerating at 50% a year." In June 2025, Straubel announced a new initiative called Redwood Energy, which repurposes retired EV battery packs into energy storage for data centers. In an interview with CNBC, he demonstrated a microgrid powering an AI training data center, built from hundreds of old automotive battery packs. Straubel said the batteries, even at reduced capacity, can provide three to five years of additional usable life in this less demanding application. He expressed optimism about the future of energy, transportation, and autonomy, stating, "I personally am an optimist. I'm very bullish that I can usher in a whole wave of growth and prosperity."
“Technology is intimately linked to manufacturing. The two can't really exist without each other. Manufacturing, especially of new products with new methods and integrating new technology, is really innovative and often has a higher impact on the end product cost or availability than even the design of the product itsel...”
“When scaling the Model 3 and Model Y, we realized that producing 300,000 cars a year would require the entire world's supply of lithium-ion batteries. This was a big problem because you can't just buy twice what the world already makes, so we had to build a whole new gigafactory to create a much bigger scale of lithium...”
“We made a lot of decisions in great uncertainty, engineering the factory while building it, launching designs at 80% completion to go faster, knowing we might have to scrap some work but that it would be worth it to speed up the process.”
“Redwood's mission is to invent and implement a circular economy for lithium-ion batteries, focusing on recycling, reuse, refining, and remanufacturing to close the loop on critical materials like nickel, lithium, copper, and cobalt, which are nearly infinitely reusable within batteries.”
“Today, Redwood recycles almost 70 to 75% of all lithium-ion batteries in the US and is the second largest nickel and lithium supplier in the country from recycled materials, often displacing what would have come from mining.”
“Handling logistics for end-of-life batteries is a huge effort because they can be damaged, involved in accidents, fires, or floods, requiring careful decommissioning and safe packaging before transport to avoid stranded batteries.”
“I am optimistic that over time we will shift to a more recycled ecosystem for materials fueling the energy and battery sectors, eventually recovering 95 to 98% of these materials, powered by renewable energy and reducing the need for mining.”
“New technology shifts and rapidly ramped products open opportunities to think about end-of-life ecosystems. For example, solar panels and e-waste are future waste streams that need attention, while lead-acid batteries are already highly recycled due to their maturity.”
“Attracting top talent to difficult locations like Nevada requires a strong mission that people can rally around, which transcends location challenges and perks, making employees feel rewarded and energized by the direct impact of their work.”
“Battery recycling is likely to be regionalized due to the hazards and difficulties in transporting batteries long distances, which is a benefit because raw materials tend to stay within the region of consumption, helping bootstrap domestic supply chains.”
“This behind us here is an array of hundreds of old automotive battery packs that we've architected and connected all together to create its own microgrid and power this AI training data center.”
“Even at 50% capacity, we can make very productive use of that in this type of application.”
“We're seeing doubling every year in the amount of material coming into us.”
“We were able to do this in about four months of construction. This is operating outside of the grid. So we didn't put any extra stress on the grid. And that's key for the AI. Growth today is to be able to get access to more power quickly. This is a way to do that.”
“EVs have clearly crossed a tipping point. There's a lot of turbulence and confusion about which incentives will last and how they will unfold. But EVs are still setting records every quarter in terms of their growth.”
JB Straubel, co-founder of Tesla and the battery recycling firm Redwood Materials, spoke at our May symposium with MIT MechE ...
CNBC's Phil LeBeau talks with JB Straubel, Redwood Materials CEO and Tesla co-founder, to discuss the Redwood's new ...
In this exclusive fireside chat at Benchmark Mineral Intelligence's flagship Benchmark Week conference in Los Angeles, Tesla ...
At the opening fireside discussion for Benchmark week 2024, JB Straubel, founder of Redwood Materials, discusses the ...
Redwood Materials Founder and CEO JB Straubel discusses reusable components of EV batteries and the importance of ...
The Big Ideas in Sustainability event series invites global thought leaders on climate and sustainability for conversations that ...
From electric vehicles to grid scale storage for wind and solar, demand for batteries is expected to grow 500% by 2030. In order to ...
Demand for lithium ion batteries is expected to grow 500% by 2030, and the race for raw materials is on. Lithium mines around the ...
JB Straubel, Founder and CEO of Redwood Materials, gave the Conradin von Gugelberg Memorial keynote at Stanford GSB's ...
Redwood Materials CEO and Founder J.B. Straubel joins Caroline Hyde and Ed Ludlow to discuss how Redwood Materials plans to build enough components to make 1 million EV batteries a year with the loan from a US Department of Energy program.
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