Original Article

The LISA project: opportunities and challenges of recycling automotive heat exchangers^☆

¹ Jönköping University, School of Engineering, Materials and Manufacturing, Jönköping, Sweden
² Bryne AB, Diö, Sweden
³ Gränges Finspång, Finspång, Sweden
⁴ Lund University, Faculty of Engineering, Production and Materials Engineering, Lund, Sweden

^* e-mail: christina.windmark@iprod.lth.se

Received: 16 July 2024
Accepted: 28 October 2024

Abstract

A modern vehicle typically has up to ten different heat exchangers, ensuring prolonged technology life, improved performance, and passenger comfort. Heat exchangers for automotive applications are made of multilayer-clad brazed aluminium. They are mature products, having been used in passenger and commercial internal combustion engine vehicles for decades, and their use will continue in electrified vehicles to cool batteries, power electronics and other components that exchange heat with the environment. With the increased awareness of the industrial impact on sustainability and commitment to scientific-based targets, the push for circularity drives the need for economically viable solutions to recycle the multilayered materials in automotive heat exchangers. The project’s final goal is to identify the value chain’s sustainability, cost-improvement potential, and business opportunities to minimise material degradation and value losses. This work presents the research methods used in the project to approach the last two steps of the value chain. The results of the laboratory-scale remelting experiments are promising and indicate the possibility of recycling heat exchangers to produce new ones, keeping the material within the same value chain and limiting the material value losses. There is also an increased drive for cost calculations in products, and the foundations of a techno-economic model are being developed to assess the outcome of future recycling operations.