SBIR Phase I: Recovery of Critical Metals from Lithium Ion Battery Black Mass

SBIR 第一阶段：从锂离子电池黑料中回收关键金属

• 批准号: 2029799
• 负责人: Catherine Kollhoff
• 金额: $ 25.6万
• 依托单位: NUMIX Materials Inc.
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2020-12-01 至 2022-05-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2029799&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: SBIR; Phase; Recovery; Critical; Metals

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project is the creation of a reliable, economically viable, and cost-effective domestic supply of cobalt, nickel, and manganese by harvesting critical metals from spent lithium ion batteries. These critical metals are needed in modern infrastructure, transportation and communication. Today, the United States imports 78% of cobalt it consumes annually but recycles only 5% of cobalt-containing lithium-ion batteries. Replacing cobalt with nickel and manganese in these batteries puts supply of those metals at risk. This project proposes a straightforward recovery process to create supply chain stability, more economic activity through recyclers and less landfilling of potentially dangerous lithium ion batteries. The project aims to create standalone processing units that can be added to existing battery processing to create a refined source of these key metals for domestic use.This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project seeks to validate a new approach to lithium ion battery recycling by integrating a metal sulfide sorbent technology into a capacitive deionization (CDI) electrochemical system for scalable and efficient recovery of cobalt, nickel, and manganese from spent batteries. CDI is an emerging process for removing charged species from a feed solution using porous electrodes. This work pairs CDI with efficient metal-sulfide sorbents by integrating the sorbent material into the cathodes for efficient recovery of critical metals from black mass leach solution. While CDI has typically involved carbon cathodes, metal sulfide sorbents have been selected for surface doping owing to their remarkable stability, adsorption capacity, and expected amenability to casting. The proposed work will: 1) demonstrate viable cation uptake from black mass into the sorbent material; 2) construct a capacitive deionization cell with the sorbent material integrated into the cathode for increased recovery; and 3) demonstrate recovery with appropriate selectivity toward cobalt, nickel, and manganese separations from black mass using a novel CDI cell.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

小型企业创新研究(SBIR)第一阶段项目的更广泛影响/商业潜力是通过从废锂离子电池中收集关键金属，创建可靠、经济可行和具有成本效益的国内钴、镍和锰供应。这些关键金属在现代基础设施、交通和通讯中是必需的。如今，美国每年消耗的钴有78%是进口的，但回收的含钴锂离子电池只有5%。在这些电池中用镍和锰取代钴，使这些金属的供应面临风险。该项目提出了一个简单的回收过程，以创造供应链稳定，通过回收商更多的经济活动，并减少潜在危险的锂离子电池的垃圾填埋。该项目旨在创建独立的处理单元，可以添加到现有的电池处理中，以创建这些关键金属的精炼来源，供家庭使用。这个小型企业创新研究(SBIR)第一阶段项目旨在通过将金属硫化物吸附剂技术集成到电容去离子(CDI)电化学系统中来验证锂离子电池回收的新方法，以便可扩展和高效地从废旧电池中回收钴、镍和锰。CDI是一种使用多孔电极从料液中去除带电物种的新兴工艺。这项工作将CDI与高效的金属-硫化物吸着剂结合在一起，将吸着剂材料集成到阴极中，以有效地从黑色大量浸出液中回收关键金属。虽然CDI通常涉及碳阴极，但金属硫化物吸着剂因其显著的稳定性、吸附能力和预期的铸造舒适性而被选为表面掺杂。拟议的工作将：1)展示从黑色物质中可行地将阳离子吸收到吸附材料中；2)构建电容去离子电池，将吸附材料集成到阴极中以提高回收率；以及3)使用新型CDI电池展示从黑色质量中适当选择性地分离钴、镍和锰的回收。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。