Recovery of metal values from spent manganese batteries using thermal treatment

Abstract

This study focused on a newly proposed recycling process to recover electrodic powder enriched with manganese and zinc from spent manganese batteries. In addition, this new process was designed to prevent the explosion of batteries during thermal treatment under inert atmosphere. Spent manganese batteries were heated over a range of 300–600°C for 2 h and each component was completely separated inside the reactor after experimentation. Electrodic powder was successfully recovered from bulk components containing several pieces of metal through a sieving operation. The electrodic powder obtained was examined by X-ray diffraction (XRD) and atomic absorption spectroscopy (AA) and image of the powder was taken by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). It was found that manganese and zinc were recovered at rates of 36 and 23 wt-% respectively in the electrodic powder.