scholarly journals Improving Separation Efficiency in End-of-Life Lithium-Ion Batteries Flotation Using Attrition Pre-Treatment

Minerals ◽  
2022 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 72
Author(s):  
Anna Vanderbruggen ◽  
Aliza Salces ◽  
Alexandra Ferreira ◽  
Martin Rudolph ◽  
Rodrigo Serna-Guerrero

The comminution of spent lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) produces a powder containing the active cell components, commonly referred to as “black mass.” Recently, froth flotation has been proposed to treat the fine fraction of black mass (<100 µm) as a method to separate anodic graphite particles from cathodic lithium metal oxides (LMOs). So far, pyrolysis has been considered as an effective treatment to remove organic binders in the black mass in preparation for flotation separation. In this work, the flotation performance of a pyrolyzed black mass obtained from an industrial recycling plant was improved by adding a pre-treatment step consisting of mechanical attrition with and without kerosene addition. The LMO recovery in the underflow product increased from 70% to 85% and the graphite recovery remained similar, around 86% recovery in the overflow product. To understand the flotation behavior, the spent black mass from pyrolyzed LIBs was compared to a model black mass, comprising fully liberated LMOs and graphite particles. In addition, ultrafine hydrophilic particles were added to the flotation feed as an entrainment tracer, showing that the LMO recovery in overflow products is a combination of entrainment and true flotation mechanisms. This study highlights that adding kerosene during attrition enhances the emulsification of kerosene, simultaneously increasing its (partial) spread on the LMOs, graphite, and residual binder, with a subsequent reduction in selectivity.

Metals ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 149
Author(s):  
Alexandra Holzer ◽  
Stefan Windisch-Kern ◽  
Christoph Ponak ◽  
Harald Raupenstrauch

The bottleneck of recycling chains for spent lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) is the recovery of valuable metals from the black matter that remains after dismantling and deactivation in pre‑treatment processes, which has to be treated in a subsequent step with pyrometallurgical and/or hydrometallurgical methods. In the course of this paper, investigations in a heating microscope were conducted to determine the high-temperature behavior of the cathode materials lithium cobalt oxide (LCO—chem., LiCoO2) and lithium iron phosphate (LFP—chem., LiFePO4) from LIB with carbon addition. For the purpose of continuous process development of a novel pyrometallurgical recycling process and adaptation of this to the requirements of the LIB material, two different reactor designs were examined. When treating LCO in an Al2O3 crucible, lithium could be removed at a rate of 76% via the gas stream, which is directly and purely available for further processing. In contrast, a removal rate of lithium of up to 97% was achieved in an MgO crucible. In addition, the basic capability of the concept for the treatment of LFP was investigated whereby a phosphorus removal rate of 64% with a simultaneous lithium removal rate of 68% was observed.


RSC Advances ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (39) ◽  
pp. 24132-24136
Author(s):  
Liurui Li ◽  
Tairan Yang ◽  
Zheng Li

The pre-treatment efficiency of the direct recycling strategy in recovering end-of-life Li-ion batteries is predicted with levels of control factors.


Metals ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (8) ◽  
pp. 1107 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lisa Brückner ◽  
Julia Frank ◽  
Tobias Elwert

Research for the recycling of lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) started about 15 years ago. In recent years, several processes have been realized in small-scale industrial plants in Europe, which can be classified into two major process routes. The first one combines pyrometallurgy with subsequent hydrometallurgy, while the second one combines mechanical processing, often after thermal pre-treatment, with metallurgical processing. Both process routes have a series of advantages and disadvantages with respect to legislative and health, safety and environmental requirements, possible recovery rates of the components, process robustness, and economic factors. This review critically discusses the current status of development, focusing on the metallurgical processing of LIB modules and cells. Although the main metallurgical process routes are defined, some issues remain unsolved. Most process routes achieve high yields for the valuable metals cobalt, copper, and nickel. In comparison, lithium is only recovered in few processes and with a lower yield, albeit a high economic value. The recovery of the low value components graphite, manganese, and electrolyte solvents is technically feasible but economically challenging. The handling of organic and halogenic components causes technical difficulties and high costs in all process routes. Therefore, further improvements need to be achieved to close the LIB loop before high amounts of LIB scrap return.


2018 ◽  
Vol 228 ◽  
pp. 633-644 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dongsheng Ren ◽  
Xiang Liu ◽  
Xuning Feng ◽  
Languang Lu ◽  
Minggao Ouyang ◽  
...  

Minerals ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (7) ◽  
pp. 784
Author(s):  
Anna Dańczak ◽  
Ronja Ruismäki ◽  
Tommi Rinne ◽  
Lassi Klemettinen ◽  
Hugh O’Brien ◽  
...  

One possible way of recovering metals from spent lithium-ion batteries is to integrate the recycling with already existing metallurgical processes. This study continues our effort on integrating froth flotation and nickel-slag cleaning process for metal recovery from spent batteries (SBs), using anodic graphite as the main reductant. The SBs used in this study was a froth fraction from flotation of industrially prepared black mass. The effect of different ratios of Ni-slag to SBs on the time-dependent phase formation and metal behavior was investigated. The possible influence of graphite and sulfur contents in the system on the metal alloy/matte formation was described. The trace element (Co, Cu, Ni, and Mn) concentrations in the slag were analyzed using the laser ablation-inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS) technique. The distribution coefficients of cobalt and nickel between the metallic or sulfidic phase (metal alloy/matte) and the coexisting slag increased with the increasing amount of SBs in the starting mixture. However, with the increasing concentrations of graphite in the starting mixture (from 0.99 wt.% to 3.97 wt.%), the Fe concentration in both metal alloy and matte also increased (from 29 wt.% to 68 wt.% and from 7 wt.% to 49 wt.%, respectively), which may be challenging if further hydrometallurgical treatment is expected. Therefore, the composition of metal alloy/matte must be adjusted depending on the further steps for metal recovery.


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