Apple will use 100% recycled cobalt for its battery designs by 2025
Apple has announced plans to expand its adoption of recycled materials, with the aim of utilizing 100% recycled cobalt in battery design by 2025, while also transitioning all Apple devices to magnets composed of completely recycled rare earth elements. Additionally, all Apple-designed printed circuit boards will employ 100% recycled tin solder and 100% recycled gold plating.
Presently, over two-thirds of aluminum, nearly three-quarters of rare earth elements, and over 95% of tungsten used in Apple products come from 100% recycled materials. The company plans to further implement recycled materials in all products and achieve carbon neutrality across its product line by 2030.
In the past three years, Apple has significantly increased its incorporation of 100% certified recycled cobalt, aiming to make all Apple-designed batteries fully reliant on recycled cobalt materials by 2025. As of 2022, a quarter of the cobalt used in all products is derived from recycled materials and is utilized in the battery designs for the iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, and MacBook.
Apple continues to reduce plastic components in its product packaging, focusing on developing fiber alternatives for display films, wraps, and foam cushioning pads. The company is also working on alternatives for labels, laminates, and other plastic materials.
Over the past year, Apple has developed a customized printer that applies digital printing directly onto the packaging for the iPhone 14 and iPhone 14 Pro, eliminating the need for most labels. For the iPad Air, iPad Pro, and Apple Watch Series 8 packaging, a new overprint varnish replaces the polypropylene plastic laminate on boxes and packaging components, reducing plastic usage by over 1,100 metric tons and carbon dioxide emissions by over 2,400 metric tons.
Furthermore, Apple has partnered with organizations such as the Fund for Global Human Rights to support frontline human rights and environmental activists in Africa’s Great Lakes region and launch vocational training programs. These initiatives enable community members to transition from mining-based livelihoods to new opportunities through skill development.
Apple has committed to responsibly sourcing raw minerals and promoting the highest levels of human rights and environmental safety standards throughout its supply chain. Apple was the first electronics company to disclose the names of cobalt and lithium refineries in its supply chain and has mapped its rare earth element supply chain since 2017. Since 2015, Apple has had every named partner’s tin, tungsten, tantalum, and gold smelter and refinery audited by independent third parties.
In accordance with environmental, human rights, and supply chain impacts, Apple has listed 14 materials—including aluminum, cobalt, copper, glass, gold, lithium, paper, plastic, rare earth elements, steel, tantalum, tin, tungsten, and zinc—for recycling or remanufacturing, representing nearly 90% of materials used across its product line.
