Tesla Launches Battery Recycling Program Throughout Europe

• Unique Eco-Friendly Approach Recovers Important Metals and Reduces Carbon Footprint

• A comprehensive strategy to recycle its industry-leading battery packs throughout Europe

MAIDENHEAD, England - January 28, 2011: At the end of their long life, Tesla will recycle its battery packs at Umicore's UHT facility in Belgium. The Brussels-based materials technology company will use the expended pack material to produce an alloy that will be further refined into cobalt, nickel and other metals.

After that, Umicore (www.umicore.com/en) will transform the cobalt into high grade lithium cobalt oxide, which can be resold to battery manufacturers. One of the few byproducts of their environmentally-friendly approach is a clean inertized slag containing calcium oxides and lithium. The slag goes into the production of special grades concretes.

Umicore's battery recycling technology allows to save a minimum of 70 percent on CO2 emissions at the recovery and refining of these valuable metals. So it can substantially reduce the carbon footprint for the manufacturing of Lithium-Ion batteries.

"While we work to help lessen global dependence on petroleum-based transportation and drive down the cost of electric vehicles, we are also taking the lead in developing a closed loop battery recycling system," Tesla's Director of Energy Storage Systems Kurt Kelty wrote in a new blog about the process www.teslamotors.com/blog/teslas-closed-loop-battery-recycling-program.

Tesla has been building and selling highway-capable, fully-certified electric cars for three years, during which time the Silicon Valley-based company has championed recycling and use of non-toxic materials (www.teslamotors.com/blog/mythbusters-part-3-recycling-our-non-toxic-b attery-packs). Tesla customers do not pay extra for recycling of the battery pack, which is expected to last 7-10 years or about 160,000 kilometers under normal use.