I-Corps: Machine for Decentralized Recycling of Lithium-Ion Batteries

I-Corps项目更广泛的影响/商业潜力是开发一种机器，旨在以经济可行的方式满足锂离子电池回收需求，使其在许多方面直接造福社会。它减少了由于填埋这些电池而可能对人类和野生动物造成的环境影响和相关的健康风险。如果锂离子电池被填埋，社会将遇到土地和水污染以及填埋电池起火和爆炸等环境问题。它还减少了从矿山中提取稀有元素(如锂和钴)的需要，以便为下一代保留矿山。最后，它提高了美国的国家安全，因为回收可以将锂离子电池的主要元素或材料保持在该国制造的闭环系统中，并减少美国从其他国家进口这些元素或材料的依赖。该项目将为美国的工人和工程师创造新的就业机会，并为残疾人提供就业机会，因为工艺/机器可以自动化。这项工作将提高美国与中国和欧洲相比的经济竞争力，这两个国家目前是锂离子电池回收的先行者。i-Corps项目是基于我们的两项基础研究工作开发的回收机器，一项是有效地将电极材料与集电体分离，另一项是有效地将正负极活性物质相互分离。关键的一点是，进行分离时不会对正负极活性物质的形态和组成造成任何损害，以便分离后的材料可以直接再生并返回电池制造过程。这增加了从提议的机器获得的回收材料的利润。这两个关键的分离过程使我们能够(1)提供一个潜在的小型回收锂离子电池的机器，以及(2)使用一台机器回收不同化学成分和制造商的所有类型的锂离子电池。但是，应针对每种类型的电池调整机器运行参数。这台机器的一些价值主张是(1)它可以快速部署在任何地点，(2)它降低了废旧锂离子电池的运输、处理和存储成本，(3)它提高了回收效率，(4)它从废旧锂离子电池中产生了更有价值的输出。这一奖项反映了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。

The broader impact/commercial potential of this I-Corps project is the development of a machine designed to address the lithium-ion batteries recycling needs in an economically feasible way so that it directly benefits the society in numerous ways. It reduces the environmental impacts and the associate health risk for human and wildlife that may be caused due to landfilling these batteries. If lithium-ion batteries are landfilled, society will encounter environmental issues such as land and water contaminations and fire and explosion of landfilled batteries. It also reduces the needs to extract rare elements such as lithium and cobalt from mines to save the mines for next generations. Lastly, it improves the United States’ national security because recycling can keep the major elements or materials of lithium-ion batteries in the closed-loop of manufacturing in the country and reduces the dependency of the United States to import these elements or materials from other countries. This project will generate new jobs for labors and engineers in the United States and opens job opportunities for persons with disabilities since the process/machine can be automated. This work will increase the economic competitiveness of the United States compared to China and Europe, which are currently the pioneer in recycling lithium-ion batteries.This I-Corps project is based on the development of a recycling machine based on our two fundamental research activities, one for effective separation of electrode materials from current collectors, and one for efficient separation of anode and cathode active materials from each other. The key point is that the separations are performed without causing any damage to the morphology and composition of the anode and cathode active materials so that the separated materials can be directly regenerated and returned to the battery manufacturing process. This increases the profit from the obtained recycled materials from the proposed machine. These two key separation processes enable us to (1) offer a potentially small machine for recycling lithium-ion batteries, and (2) recycle all types of lithium-ion batteries with different chemistries and manufacturers with one machine. However, the machine operating parameters should be adjusted for each type of battery. Some of the value propositions of this machine are (1) it can be deployed fast in any location, (2) it reduces the cost of spent lithium-ion batteries transportation, handling and storage, (3) it improves the recycling efficiency, and (4) it produces more valuable outputs from spent lithium-ion batteries.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.