Opinion: Regulation needed to avert EV battery waste crisis

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Ahead of the National Environment Management Authority (NEMA) validation meeting on 16 March to finalise Kenya's Draft Electrical and Electronic Waste Management Regulations, John Ayara and Valyne Kinya of EPROK call for urgent action to integrate electric vehicle battery management into the regulatory framework. They warn that Kenya’s rapid e-mobility growth could create a battery waste crisis if end-of-life systems are not established.

• Mr Ayara is the Coordinator of the Electronic Producers Responsibility Organisation of Kenya (EPROK), and Ms Kinya is Communications Officer at the same organisation. EPROK is a Producer Responsibility Organisation (PRO) that promotes sustainable e-waste management and helps stakeholders comply with Kenya’s Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) framework.

• “Monday's validation session is an important inflection point. Stakeholders who attend, such as industry, government, civil society, and producers, have a concrete opportunity to put EV battery management on the table, to ask that the finalised regulations anticipate the battery wave rather than react to it,” they say.

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By John Ayara and Valyne Kinya 

On Monday, 16^th March 2026, the National Environment Management Authority (NEMA) will convene a long-awaited national validation meeting to finalise Kenya's Draft Electrical and Electronic Waste Management Regulations, 2025. It is a significant moment for environmental governance in Kenya and an opportunity that must not be squandered. Because six weeks ago, the Kenyan government launched a policy that is about to make those regulations even more consequential than their drafters may have anticipated.

On February 3^rd , 2026, Kenya launched the National Electric Mobility Policy, a comprehensive framework aimed at transforming the transport sector and positioning Kenya as a regional leader in clean mobility. The policy arrives at a pivotal moment. Transport consumes roughly 72 percent of all imported petroleum products, costing Kenya KES 628.4 billion in 2022 alone. With a grid already 90 percent powered by renewable sources, the country has a ready-made foundation for an electric vehicle revolution that can simultaneously cut emissions and reduce the national import bill.

The numbers behind that revolution are already stunning. Between 2022 and 2025, Kenya's registered electric vehicle fleet grew by 2,700 percent — from 1,378 units to over 39,000. The bodaboda sector has led the charge, propelled by battery-swapping networks and accessible asset financing. This is no longer a niche transition. It is a mass-market movement, and it is moving fast.

What makes the new e-mobility policy particularly noteworthy is its forward-looking approach to one of the most complex challenges in this transition: battery management. The framework explicitly recognises that batteries cannot be treated like conventional waste. It mandates the Kenya Bureau of Standards (KEBS) to develop residual battery life requirements for imported used electric vehicles; a necessary safeguard against Kenya becoming a dumping ground for degraded batteries from overseas markets. KEBS has already begun prohibiting the importation of used electric vehicles with battery life below 80 percent. The policy also commits the government to providing fiscal incentives for the development of local battery recycling and repurposing industries.

These provisions reflect a genuine understanding that the environmental benefits of electric mobility depend not only on removing tailpipe emissions, but on managing the full lifecycle of vehicles. A battery improperly disposed of can leach toxic materials into soil and water, while one recycled responsibly can yield valuable minerals for reuse.

Yet for all its foresight, the e-mobility policy now encounters the reality of Kenya's existing environmental legislation, and this is where the gap becomes urgent. The Environmental Management and Coordination Act, 1999, and the Sustainable Waste Management Act, 2022, which form the backbone of the country's waste governance, were not designed with lithium-ion traction batteries in mind. The Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) Regulations, 2024, establish a comprehensive framework for holding producers accountable for end-of-life management, but they currently list ICT equipment, solar panels, and general e-waste as covered categories. EV batteries are not yet explicitly included, leaving a regulatory gap that is no longer theoretical.

The scale of what is coming is significant. The e-mobility policy targets 30 percent of all motorcycle registrations to be electric by 2027, translating to more than 63,000 electric two-wheelers sold annually within two years. Each contains a lithium-ion battery with a typical lifespan of three to five years. Kenya is not approaching its first wave of retired EV batteries; it is now within sight of it. The question of where they will go cannot wait for the next policy cycle.

This is where producer responsibility becomes essential, and where organisations like EPROK (Electronic-waste Producer Responsibility Organization of Kenya) are already working to bridge policy and practical implementation. The principle of Extended Producer Responsibility holds that those who place products on the market should bear financial or physical responsibility for managing them at the end of life. Through a collective scheme such as EPROK, EV manufacturers and importers can jointly contribute towards setting up collection and recycling systems, ensuring that when a battery degrades beyond use, infrastructure exists to process it responsibly, and that hazardous components do not end up in informal dumpsites.

Extending this model to electric vehicle batteries requires one thing above all: updating the regulatory framework to include them explicitly. Kenya's broader environmental regulations must make clear provision for lithium-ion traction batteries, with appropriate fee structures that reflect the chemistry and risk profile of different battery types. This is not a complicated legislative step. It is a deliberate one.

Which brings us back to Monday's validation meeting. The Draft Electrical and Electronic Waste Management Regulations, 2025 — which have already been postponed twice, first from December 2025 and again from February 2026 — are being finalised at exactly the moment when Kenya's e-mobility transition demands that they go further. The e-mobility policy has established five Technical Working Groups to drive implementation, covering legal reform, manufacturing, charging infrastructure, skills development, and fiscal measures. Notably absent is a dedicated working group on waste and the circular economy. Environmental agencies sit as members of other groups, raising real questions about whether end-of-life considerations will receive focused attention.

Monday's validation session is an important inflection point. Stakeholders who attend, such as industry, government, civil society, and producers, have a concrete opportunity to put EV battery management on the table, to ask that the finalised regulations anticipate the battery wave rather than react to it. The time to build systems for managing batteries is before the batteries themselves arrive.

None of the gaps identified here are insurmountable. A well-designed circular economy for EV batteries would also create green jobs in battery refurbishment, repurposing for stationary energy storage, and eventually recycling at scale. Kenya has the chance to build not just an electric vehicle market, but a closed-loop system that turns the end of a battery's life into the beginning of new value.

The National E-Mobility Policy has laid an impressive foundation. This Monday, as NEMA's validation meeting opens, Kenya has a narrow and important window to ensure that the circular economy is built into the regulatory structure from the ground up,  so that when the first generation of Kenyan EVs reaches the end of life, a responsible, functional system is ready to receive them.