This is exactly what we would expect to happen. There was a major supply crunch for batteries which incentivized people to build more battery factories which caused a projected crunch in the mining sector, but the mining sector saw the writing on the wall and started ramping production too.
Now the battery costs are falling and in a few years we will probably see an oversupply situation which will be good times for anybody who uses batteries. I'm a bit hopeful about decarbonization efforts for the latter half of the decade. I think battery prices will drop enough to make grid storage viable in more places and further allow the deployment of wind and solar generation. As this article mentions EVs will see a major price drop in their most expensive component.
Then of course a bunch of the manufacturers will go out of business because the prices dropped too low and then the market will consolidate into a couple of companies and prices will creep upward again as they fail to compete with each other. But that's a problem for the future.
For the next 10 years, I don't think we'll see an oversupply of batteries. There's simply too many ready to deploy applications for them that will accelerate as cost comes down.
Grid storage is the major one. As price starts to decline you are going to see power providers soak up any excess battery supply.
Battery recycling is also very good. Most all car batteries are recycled. Once you have enough lithium or whatever dug up, it'll just get cheaper to recycle for the most part.
EV battery recycling is WIP right now. At the moment it's still cheaper to dig up new lithium and cobalt, but I guess a lot of that is there just aren't enough old batteries available to recycle to cover demand right now.
There are companies that take old EV batteries and break then down. The steel and plastic is recycled. The valuable metals end up in one big lump right now, but as I understand they are storing them for future use as that part is still being commercially developed and they expect it to be valuable.
If we take a look at lead acid batteries, the majority of the lead that is used in the manufacturing of new batteries comes from old batteries that are recycled.
Now the battery costs are falling and in a few years we will probably see an oversupply situation which will be good times for anybody who uses batteries. I'm a bit hopeful about decarbonization efforts for the latter half of the decade. I think battery prices will drop enough to make grid storage viable in more places and further allow the deployment of wind and solar generation. As this article mentions EVs will see a major price drop in their most expensive component.
Then of course a bunch of the manufacturers will go out of business because the prices dropped too low and then the market will consolidate into a couple of companies and prices will creep upward again as they fail to compete with each other. But that's a problem for the future.