Scalable Direct Recycling of Cathode Black Mass from Spent Lithium-Ion Batteries

Abstract

End of life (EoL) lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) are piling up at an intimidating rate which is alarming for the environmental health and balance. The rise of renewable technologies such as electric vehicles (EV) needs to be balanced with LIB recycling to reduce the carbon footprint, ensure sustainable development, and create a circular supply chain. LiNixCoyMnzO2 (NCM) cathode materials being a dominant chemistry in high energy LIBs makes a huge portion of this waste accumulation. Direct recycling is one of the most promising ways to turn this waste to wealth but has been limited to lab-scale due to lack of robustness, namely the tedious pretreatment required which involve toxic organic solvents. Herein, we have demonstrated a process which integrates the pretreatment and relithiation of the cathode black. Cathode material from EoL EV batteries is treated in 100g per batch operation and the regenerated cathode active material demonstrates 100% electrochemical performance recovery, with 91% yield rate, and showed promise to further scale up. No use of toxic organic solvents makes our process unique with minimal environmental impact. This process has the advantages of integration, scalability, and universality, which clears the barricade for the direct recycling to move from lab to industry scale with considerable profitability.