Chemical Engineering June 2023 - 13

Newsfront
Lithium Extraction:
Prime Time for Brine
Technologies to process lithium-containing brines are in high demand as manufacturers seek to
improve recovery volumes and sustainability
T
he two main sources of lithium
- one of the most in-demand
materials on earth - are mining
from ores and extracting
from brines. An estimated 60 to 70%
of global lithium reserves are found in
the brines of South America's Lithium
Triangle region, spanning the salars
(salt plains) of Chile, Argentina and
Bolivia (Figure 1). However, there is
also promise in extracting lithium from
geothermal brines and the wastewater
of traditional mining sites. Although
hard-rock mining has been a
dominant technology, brine extraction
is seen as having an overall smaller
carbon footprint, especially with projects
that can employ direct lithium
extraction (DLE). While the majority
of established projects in the salars
evaporate the brine to recover its
lithium content, DLE extracts lithium
from the brine without significantly
depleting the salar's brine volume.
Direct lithium production
In 2022, Energy Exploration Technologies
Inc. (EnergyX; Austin, Tex.;
www.energyx.com) became the first
company to design, build and commission
an in-field pilot plant in the
Lithium Triangle. EnergyX has developed
the LiTAS suite of processes
for DLE and refining, which includes
patented technologies for membrane
extraction, solvent extraction and ion
absorption. " Our overarching goal is
DLE. No single technology is onesize-fits-all,
so solutions are designed
for each specific brine. It's a technology-agnostic,
holistic approach, " says
Teague Egan, CEO of EnergyX. Not
only does the company hold multiple
patents at the materials level, covering
membrane elements, ion-adsorption
beads and solvents, it has also
developed proprietary methods for inAlbemarle
FIGURE
1. The salars of South America hold the
vast majority of global lithium brines
terfacing the different unit operations,
to optimize system integration to minimize
water usage and maximize yield.
Demonstrated lithium-recovery yields
in LiTAS field tests were greater than
90%, compared with 30-40% for
other brine processes. To design the
optimal combination of technologies
for a specific brine, there are several
parameters that must be considered,
including lithium concentration, the
impurity profile, the ratio of impurities
to lithium, the brine temperature and
other inputs that may limit the process,
such as regional water scarcity
or the use of hydrochloric acid, sulfuric
acid or soda ash, says Egan.
" Our first pilot plant in the field has
a capacity to produce three tons of
lithium per year, with a 94% lithium
recovery rate. Following this validation
point, we are scaling up those
systems to demonstration-scale test
beds, which produce approximately
50 tons of lithium per year. That will
be the last step before commercialization, "
says Egan. The larger
demonstration plants are planned
for Argentina, Chile, California, Utah
and Arkansas. To bolster these commercialization
efforts, GM Ventures is
leading a $50-million Series B financing
round for EnergyX.
The preferred form of lithium for
battery production is lithium hydroxide
monohydrate (LHM), so technoloCHEMICAL
ENGINEERING WWW.CHEMENGONLINE.COM
JUNE 2023
gies that simplify the steps required
to yield LHM are highly in demand.
Typical conversion of lithium carbonate
to LHM requires several stages
that need significant water, energy
and space. These processes can
also produce large volumes of waste,
and considerable lithium can be lost
through co-precipitation with calcium
carbonate, which can reduce lithium
yield by as much as 20%.
IBC Advanced Technologies, Inc.
(American Fork, Utah; www.ibcmrt.
com) has developed a proprietary
high-yield extraction process for converting
brines to battery-grade endproducts,
Direct Lithium to Product
(DLP; Figure 2). " The DLP process
has demonstrated a 99% overall recovery
rate of lithium from brine to
production of over 99.5% pure LHM
at large pilot scale. High extraction
efficiency translates into less downstream
processing volume per unit
of brine treated and lower processing
requirements due to the high purity
of the extracted lithium, " says Steven
Izatt, president and CEO of IBC Advanced
Technologies.
Furthermore,
he continues: " many process steps
are thereby avoided, along with the
consequent consumption of water,
energy, reagents, equipment and
the environmental deterioration that
results from the need to separate
impurity species. "
A self-contained process, DLP's
first step is selective extraction of
lithium directly from brine using the
company's automated Molecular
Recognition Technology (MRT), which
features proprietary SuperLig resin
beads that are not only highly selective
for lithium over other brine constituents,
including magnesium, calcium,
sodium, potassium and boron,
but are also designed with rapid bind13

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Chemical Engineering June 2023

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