Critical metals in lithium-ion battery (LIB) manufacturing face supply chain issues that result from limited primary resources and rising metal prices. As more LIBs reach their end-of-life, spent batteries are good sources of these critical materials, such as graphite, lithium, nickel, and cobalt. From the Critical Materials Institute (CMI), our electrochemical (EC) leaching process isolates graphite and metallic copper by electricity and generates a leachate solution of metals. This leachate contains critical metals Li, Co, and Ni; however, other impurity metals (Al and Fe) are present in the leachate. The impurity metals are removed through a precipitation process, and then the critical metals can be extracted through other extraction operations, that include precipitation, solvent extraction, ion-exchange, and electrodialysis. Overall, we have successfully developed a feasible and flexible recovery of critical materials from LIB black mass that produces high purity metal salts from recycled waste LIB materials.

Critical metals recovery from recycled battery materials

Where thousands of chemistry professionals meet to share ideas and advance scientific and technical knowledge. Spring 2023 abstracts, posters, and presentations will launch at the end of March.

ACS Spring 2023

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.