Materials recovery from NMC batteries with water as the sole solvent.

We report an environmentally benign recycling approach for large-capacity nickel manganese cobalt (NMC) batteries through the electrochemical concentration of lithium on the anode and subsequent recovery with only water. Cycling of the NMC pouch cells indicated the potential for maximum lithium recovery at a 5C charging rate. The anodes extracted from discharged and disassembled cells were submerged in deionized water, resulting in lithium dissolution and graphite recovery from the copper foils.

Packing bimodal magnetic particles to fabricate highly dense anisotropic rare earth bonded permanent magnets.

Highly dense and magnetically anisotropic rare earth bonded magnets have been fabricated packing bimodal magnetic particles using a batch extrusion process followed by compression molding technology. The bimodal feedstock was a 96 wt% magnet powder mixture, with 40% being anisotropic Sm-Fe-N (3 μm) and 60% being anisotropic Nd-Fe-B (100 μm) as fine and coarse particles, respectively; these were blended with a 4 wt% polyphenylene sulfide (PPS) polymer binder to fabricate the bonded magnets. The hybrid bonded magnet with an 81 vol% magnet loading yielded a density of 6.

Electrochemical-driven green recovery of lithium, graphite and cathode from lithium-ion batteries using water.

The expected exponential increase in consumption of lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) would pose a unique challenge to the availability of near-critical resources like lithium and graphite in the upcoming decade. We present a lithium recovery process that utilizes a degradation mechanism, i.e.

Solvent-driven fractional crystallization for atom-efficient separation of metal salts from permanent magnet leachates.

This work reports a dimethyl ether-driven fractional crystallization process for separating rare earth elements and transition metals. The process has been successfully applied in the treatment of rare earth element-bearing permanent magnet leachates as an atom-efficient, reagent-free separation method. Using ~5 bar pressure, the solvent was dissolved into the aqueous system to displace the contained metal salts as solid precipitates.

Magnetohydrodynamic Control of Interfacial Degradation in Lithium-Ion Batteries for Fast Charging Applications.

Interfacial anodic degradation in graphitic materials under fast charging conditions causes severe performance loss and safety hazard in lithium ion batteries. We present a novel method for minimizing the growth of these aging mechanism by application of an external magnetic field. Under magnetic field, paramagnetic lithium ions experience a magnetohydrodynamic force, which rotates the perpendicularly diffusing species and homogenizes the ionic transport.