Light Elements Technology: Light Elements: Lithium & Alkalis and Silicon
Sponsored by: TMS Light Metals Division
Program Organizers: Neale Neelameggham, IND LLC; Kiran Solanki, Arizona State University; Prashanth Saraswat, Department of Metallurgy; Huimin Lu, Beijing Ofikintai Technology Co Ltd.; Onuralp Yucel, Istanbul Technical University

Wednesday 2:00 PM
March 22, 2023
Room: 30D
Location: SDCC

Session Chair: Alafara Baba, University of Ilorin; Prashant Saraswat, university of utah


2:00 PM Introductory Comments

2:05 PM  
A New Method for Producing Hydrogen, Lithium Metal and High-purity Silicon from Spodumene Ore: Huimin Lu1; Neale Neelameggham2; Bin Li3; 1Beijing Ofikintai Technology Co Ltd.; 2IND LLC; 3University of Nevada, Reno
    There are a large amount of spodumene deposits in Ganzi Prefecture, Sichuan Province, China. This project directly uses spodumene ore as raw material, produces aluminum-silicon alloy by electrothermal method, and then separates aluminum and silicon by three-layer liquid method to obtain 3N high-purity silicon. Liquid aluminum is made into aluminum powder, which is transported to the place where hydrogen is required hydrogen production is carried out; the smelting dust containing 20~30% of lithium oxide is collected, and the monohydrate lithium hydroxide is prepared by the alkaline method of micro-pressure heating, and the metal lithium is produced by the electrothermal method. Hydrogen, metallic lithium and high-purity silicon are directly produced from spodumene ore, and the resources are comprehensively utilized.

2:30 PM  
Electrochemical Technology for Li-isotope Separation: Prashant Sarswat1; Michael Free1; 1University of Utah
    In terms of technology, it is essential to be able to produce materials with an enriched isotopic abundance, which is one that differs from natural abundance. Nuclear fuels, isotope-substituted compounds for chemistry and biology study, environmental geochemical signature tracers, radioactive tracers, nondestructive testing, radiation in human medicine, and other applications are only a few of the many uses for isotopes. The isotopic separation of many elements, including hydrogen, lithium, and iodine, among many others, is a frequently discussed research topic. Lithium isotopes are particularly significant among these isotopes for a number of purposes, including strategic areas. Since these isotopes are light, it is difficult to separate or enrich them. With an emphasis on electrochemical approaches for stable lithium isotope separation, selected major categories of Li isotope separation are discussed in-this presentation.

2:50 PM  
Recovery of Lithium from Waste LIBs Using Sulfuric Acid Roasting and Water Washing: Manis Kumar Jha1; Pankaj Kumar Choubey1; Rekha Panda1; Om Shankar Dinkar1; Nityanand Singh1; 1CSIR-National Metallurgical Laboratory
    Lithium (Li) is one of the important elements used in the manufacturing of LIBs. In view of increasing demand of Li, lack of natural resources and generation of huge spent LIBs containing black mass (LiCoO2), present paper reports a developed process at CSIR-NML consist of sulfuric acid roasting followed by water leaching for selective recovery of Li from black mass (LiCoO2) of spent LIBs. Different process parameters viz. time, temperature, mass to volume (m/v) ratio were optimized for the roasting of cathode material. Result shows that roasting at 750 °C in 120 min maintaining m/v ratio of LiCoO2/H2SO4: 1/0.2, the Li2O of cathode material gets converted into Li2SO4. Further, 95.8% Li was dissolved from roasted mass at 75 °C using de-ionized water within 120 min. Thereafter, Li was precipitated as carbonate (Li2CO3) using Na2CO3 between pH 11 to 12 at 90 oC.

3:10 PM  
High-grade Li2SO4 from a Local Montebrasite Ore as Industrial Raw Material for Managing Bipolar Disorder: Alafara Baba1; Daud Olaoluwa2; Ayo Balogun3; Oluwagbemiga Adebola1; 1University of Ilorin; 2University of Ilorin & The Federal Polytechnic, Ede; 3University of Ilorin & Kogi State College of Education (Technical), Kabba
    Montebrasite is an uncommon lithium phosphate mineral with about 10% Li2O composition which makes it an interesting source of lithium classified as critical metal with increasing demand due to its applications in high-technology products. A Nigerian montebrasite ore with Li2O assayed 12.47% was examined in this study. The initial sulphate roasting technique employed varying the mass concentration (w/w) of ore: salt between 1:1 and 1:4, temperature range of 500 to 1000oC, and roasting time up to 120 minutes. This was followed by an aqueous leaching reaction at a fixed temperature of 75oC for 120 minutes with moderate agitation. At optimal conditions, 83% of lithium was extracted by this process and beneficiated to obtain almost 90% pure Li2SO4, well characterized for use in the treatment of the bipolar disorder, as a potential component of conducting glasses, lithium-ion batteries, and in the synthesis of defined organic compounds.

3:30 PM Break

3:45 PM  
Sodium Metal from Sodium Sulfate - Using Aluminum and Molten Iron Reaction Medium: Jed Checketts1; 1Powerball Technologies
    Since our earlier TMS presentation "Manufacturing of Hydrogen on Demand Using Aluminum Can Scrap with Near Zero Waste", advances have been made. As before, aluminum scrap and sodium sulfate offer an inexpensive source for process raw material. Here we introduce an improvement as the aluminum drives a high temperature molten iron - iron oxide loop for Na2SO4 decomposition. Our work shows the additional use of aluminum in a new 2-step process to produce sodium metal. As before, the sodium metal is used to manufacture sodium hydride. Sodium hydride Powerballs provide the means to produce hydrogen at 700 bar for each Fuel Cell vehicle upon demand. This chemical solution eliminates the need for mechanical hydrogen compression. The distribution of plastic encapsulated Powerballs to hydrogen fueling stations will increase the safety and reduce costs when compared to delivery of pressurized hydrogen tanks to the stations.