An Ultra-fast Reaction Process for Recycling Lithium Ion Batteries via Galvanic Cell Interaction

The efficient realization of closed-loop process is an ultimate goal for reusing the retired lithium-ion batteries (LIBs), yet the complicated recycling processes of leaching and purification in acid atmosphere are totally different with the regeneration method of cathode precursor in alkali solution inevitably resulting in the redundant consumption of acid/ammonia solutions and increased burden of green environment, Herein, considering the advantages of selective extraction and similar chemical surroundings between recovery and regeneration, ammonia-leaching has been proposed to achieve the short-process closed-loop recycling with effective impurity removal. Particularly, benefited from the galvanic cell interaction, the sluggish reaction rate and relative harsh reaction conditions of ammonia-leaching are well-addressed. High leaching efficiency can be achieved within 10 min, where nearly 80% valuable metals are extracted in the initial 1 min. Notably, this leaching solution after purification can be used to directly synthesize the cathode precursor by commercial alkali co-precipitation method, which is invulnerable to apply acid-base solutions back and forth. Compared with traditional solid-to-liquid reaction with shrinking core model, the solid-to-solid reaction with galvanic cell interaction substantially address the inherent issue of sluggish leaching efficiency, exhibiting much stronger competitiveness in leaching rate and environment cost. Thus, it provides prospects to achieve the large-scale recycling and regeneration of spent LIBs simultaneously in the whole-process alkali-atmosphere.