SungEel HiTech to build US recycling facility in Georgia

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp has announced lithium-ion battery recycler and raw materials provider SungEel Recycling Park Georgia LLC will locate its first U.S. recycling facility in Georgia. The company is a subsidiary of the Korea-based global industry leader SungEel HiTech Co. Ltd.  

According to a news release from Kemp’s office, the company will invest more than $37 million in the new facility and create 104 jobs in Stephens County.  

"Georgia recently announced record-breaking numbers for the fiscal year 2022, and companies like SungEel are evidence that the rapidly growing electric mobility ecosystem continues to generate new jobs for hardworking Georgians across the state," Kemp says. "Korea has been a key partner in Georgia’s growing sustainable technology industry, and I’m excited that SungEel chose the Peach State for their first U.S. facility."  

With more than 10 years of patented technology, SungEel says it specializes in recycling technology using a 100 percent fully circular system. This process, which recycles end-of-life batteries and battery manufacturing scrap, has a metal recovery rate of more than 95 percent. Recovered metals include nickel, cobalt and lithium.  

"SungEel HiTech's entry into Georgia is the last piece of the puzzle to build a sustainable ecosystem of Georgia’s electric vehicle supply chain," says Suk Jae Yim, representative of SungEel Recycling Park Georgia. "SungEel Recycling Park Georgia will conduct its full responsibility to build a U.S. eco-friendly industrial ecosystem in line with the expectations of the state of Georgia and Stephens County."  

SungEel Recycling Park Georgia’s new facility will be at the Hayestone Brady Business Park, a Georgia Ready for Accelerated Development- (GRAD-) certified site in Toccoa. The GRAD program is a proactive effort by Georgia’s economic development community to develop a portfolio of available sites ready for fast-track development. Operations are expected to begin in early 2024. Over the next few years, the company will be hiring technicians, operators, administrative and sales roles.   

Director of Korean Investment Yoonie Kim represented the Georgia Department of Economic Development (GDEcD) on this competitive project in partnership with the Stephens County Development Authority and Georgia Electric Membership Corp.  

"SungEel is a company at the cutting edge of sustainable technology, and we believe SungEel’s proximity to other members of Georgia’s electric mobility ecosystem will lead to amazing success," says GDEcD Commissioner Pat Wilson. "Creating the jobs of the future and protecting the opportunities of today means preparing key industries, such as the auto industry, for the next technological revolution."  

Kemp’s office says Georgia’s prime location, extensive infrastructure, skilled workforce and business-friendly climate has made it an attractive location for various rapidly developing industries focused on creating a sustainable future. Georgia is cultivating a vertically integrated supply chain that will help companies increase efficiencies by reducing the reliance on imported materials. Electric vehicle-related projects have contributed more than $13 billion in investments and more than 18,100 new jobs to Georgia since 2020.  

SungEel's announcement follows an earlier announcement from Igneo, a White Plains, New York-based electronics recycling company that produces high-grade copper concentrate from discarded low-grade consumer electronics, that is building a secondary smelter in Savannah, Georgia, that will process 90,000 metric tons annually once it is online in early 2024. The smelter will be fed with material from evTerra, the company's electronics recycling subsidiary. 

Recycling Today has reached out to SunEel for additional details about its facility.