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Contract Opportunity

TECHNOLOGY LICENSING OPPORTUNITY

Nickel & Cobalt Recovery from Waste Lithium-Ion Batteries

A low-cost method for recovery of critical materials from hydrometallurgical battery recycling.

Opportunity: Idaho National Laboratory (INL), managed and operated by Battelle Energy Alliance, LLC (BEA), is offering the opportunity to enter into a license and/or collaborative research agreement to commercialize this process for recovery of Ni/Co from li-ion battery leachates. This technology transfer opportunity is part of a dedicated effort to convert government-funded research into job opportunities, businesses and ultimately an improved way of life for the American people.

Overview: A growing need for Li-ion batteries (LIBs) in multiple technology sectors is applying pressure on the cost and availability of the materials used in battery components, especially the metals used in the electrodes. There are many reasons why recycling rates remain low, including issues with collection, transportation, and storage of waste batteries. However, a significant bottleneck in developing a circular economy for LIBs is the lack of cost-effective metal separations and recovery processes. Current recovery techniques that follow hydrometallurgical processes include LIBs are discharged and dismantled to remove plastic and metallic shells, followed by leaching and metals separation. Several separation steps are involved to remove impurity metals and recover LIB metal salts. However, these processes consume large quantities of chemicals and generates waste that can be costly to treat prior to disposal.

Description: Researchers at Idaho National Laboratory have developed a novel process for removing impurity metals in LIB leachates to produce high-value metal concentrates. Phosphate salts are added to battery leachates to form insoluble iron and aluminum phosphate salts at a pH 3-4. At this pH, 95-99% of the iron and aluminum salts will precipitate out from the leachate, which can be collected easily by filtration. This process showed minimal loss of cobalt, nickel manganese and lithium concentrations in cobalt and nickel-rich leachates. After precipitation of the contaminate metals from the leachate, nickel and cobalt rich salts are formed by other isolation methods.

Benefits:

• Provides a low-cost solution for metal recovery that creates leachate solutions without impurity metals, which can later generate high-purity products of cobalt, nickel, manganese, and lithium


• Other Benefits:
  
  
  
  • Controlled quantities of phosphate salts
  
  
  • Minimal pH changes for precipitation
  
  
  • Impurities precipitates are easily filtered
  
  
  • No organic solvents
  
  
  • No water dilution
  
  
  • Low energy process
  
  
  
  

Applications:

• The process has shown great promise in reducing the costs associated with hydrometallurgical processing of scrap lithium-ion battery waste.

Development Status: TRL 4, technology has been validated in a laboratory environment.

IP Status: PCT Patent Application No. PCT/US22/76134, “Methods of Separating Metals from a Lithium-Ion Battery Leachate,” BEA Docket No. BA-1280.

Additional Information

Klaehn, J. R., Shi, M., Diaz, L. A., Molina, D. E., Reich, S. M., Palasyuk, O., Repukaiti, R., & Lister, T. E. (2023). Removal of impurity metals as phosphates from Lithium-ion battery leachates. Hydrometallurgy, 106041. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.hydromet.2023.106041

INL is seeking to license the above intellectual property to a company with a demonstrated ability to bring such inventions to the market. Exclusive rights in defined fields of use may be available. Added value is placed on relationships with small businesses, start-up companies, and general entrepreneurship opportunities.

Please visit Technology Deployment’s website at https://inl.gov/inl-initiatives/technology-deployment for more information on working with INL and the industrial partnering and technology transfer process.

Companies interested in learning more about this licensing opportunity should contact Andrew Rankin at td@inl.gov.

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