Iondrive claims robustness improvement in battery recycling process

Battery recycling company Iondrive has claimed “exceptional results” in large-scale bench trials this month, using its process to recover critical minerals from end-of-life battery materials.

In a statement on Monday, the ASX-listed company shared that “a major leap forward” had been achieved in its ability to demonstrate recovery of valuable minerals, including lithium, even from lower-quality raw black mass.

“Compared to our previous trials, which  used pristine material, these new results demonstrate the robustness of our process, even with lower-quality, mixed material,” said CEO Dr Ebbe Dommisse. 

“Looking ahead, we expect to work with more consistent, higher-grade material through partnerships, which will further improve the efficiency and reliability of our recycling technology.” 

Black mass is a shiny, metallic mixture made up of shredded cathodes and anodes from batteries. Its colour is a result of the high concentration of graphite, and the mixed material is typically exported to Asia for energy-intensive pyrometallurgical and acid-leaching hydrometallurgical processing methods to recover useful metals.

According to Iondrive, its process – using deep eutectic solvents (DES) and biodegradable solvents, and developed with the University of Adelaide – is non-toxic and gives improved purity and recovery rates of metals such as nickel, manganese, cobalt, and lithium.

It describes DES as “a mixture of two solvents that work together to dissolve specific metal oxides in spent batteries”.

Iondrive said the recent tests showed mineral recoveries with the inclusion of lithium, the impact of impurities on results, and the effectiveness of pre-treatment in removing these binder and graphite impurities from black mass.

“Further, the selectivity of the extraction of the four critical minerals was maintained using both the Raw Black Mass and the Pretreated Black Mass. This selectivity improves both the efficiency and economic viability of the process,” the company said.

“Selective additional tests demonstrated the potential for 100% lithium recovery with adjustments to the solvent concentrations, with some minor loss of selectivity of the other metals. Further work will be planned to explore the economic trade-off between the metals and lithium.”

Picture: A lithium ion laptop battery (credit Kristoferb, CC BY-SA 3.0)

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