The only reason 15 year batteries are not recyclable are it will be 15 years before current cars get old enough to need that infrastructure. There is plenty of money to be made if you want to invest in recycling them, but you need to invest at the right time. You probably should be thinking about recycling in Central America or Africa (consider political issues before investing!), and make sure you don't over invest, lead acid batteries fundamentally need twice as much infrastructure because they are replaced twice as often.

Which is why the brands of cars less wealthy people buy are over-represented in the 15-25yo age group on US roads compared to when they were newer. All the stuff rich people buy get traded in, auctioned and (mostly) shipped to Central America. The stuff less well of people buy sticks around because they get private party sold to the next guy and the next guy and the next guy. You'll have an easier time finding early '00 Hyundai parts than early '00 Honda parts.

There's plenty of CRVs and SantaFes on the road but the present market share of the 2002 SantaFe has increased relative to the market share of 2002 CRVs when compared to what the situation was in 2005 or so.

We're obviously talking at a statistical, not individual level here. Of course not only wealthy people buy Hondas, just more wealthy people buy Hondas than Kias and wealthy people are more likely to trade in their old car at a dealer which makes it more likely to wind up overseas (if it's got too many miles to easily resell in the US).

I've seen lots of cars in Morocco that were more like ~30... maybe the dry air helps reducing wear, I don't know. My 10-year-old Corsa in England was starting to rust pretty bad, it wouldn't have lasted another decade for sure.

https://www.energy.gov/sites/prod/files/2017/09/f37/fotw%239...