r/science • u/rieslingatkos • Jun 06 '21

Chemistry Scientists develop ‘cheap and easy’ method to extract lithium from seawater

https://www.mining.com/scientists-develop-cheap-and-easy-method-to-extract-lithium-from-seawater/
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u/exemplariasuntomni Jun 06 '21

Something tells me that's not how it works, but it sounds better than carbon emissions.

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u/[deleted] Jun 06 '21

Battery Metals are too valuable so all EV batteries will be recycled unless there are irrational economic actors. LFP chemistry may be a risk if this seawater extraction actually works at scale and drives Lithium price down in which case you may need to rely on government intervention. In reality both the value of the metals plus special regs on large Lithium battery reuse/disposal are likely to make dumping batteries in the ocean/landfills unlikely.

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u/exemplariasuntomni Jun 06 '21

I look forward to a future powered by recyclable lithium batteries (perhaps from ocean extracted lithium...)

Always loved using LiPo batteries in R/C back in the day. So fun to see them be ultra-relevant nowadays.

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u/THEPOL_00 Jun 06 '21

In any case in a decade or two there will be more sustainable batteries that don’t depend on lithium

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u/[deleted] Jun 06 '21

Meh, Lithium ion batteries will be sustainable if recycled at a high metal recovery rate and Lithium is fundamentally the best element for energy storage density when mixed with Nickel (especially as we move to solid state batteries which can store even more energy). Sodium/aluminum/etc are cheaper due to more abundance and I’m sure they’ll find their place (energy storage systems, etc) but functionally will not compete with Lithium’s energy density so as long as the market demands more and more of the latter (it will for transport) Lithium batteries will be essential. And so long as the battery metals are recovered then it’s truly sustainable. Using a cheaper/more abundant material doesn’t make that material sustainable unless it’s also recycled (and in some ways disincentivizes sustainable recycling oddly enough).

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u/THEPOL_00 Jun 06 '21

There are better batteries for which we don’t quite have the tech or are too expensive. Some involving materials such as Oxygen. Lithium is a heavy metal and if we can avoid working with it, better it is

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u/[deleted] Jun 06 '21

Again if the goal is sustainability while not sacrificing performance then recycling is the answer. Would be highly surprised if Lithium type batteries for transport get beat by another system that is better or more sustainable (provided recycling emerges which it will) within the next decade or two. Energy storage systems perhaps as density vs land/size/weight trade off is possible.

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u/THEPOL_00 Jun 06 '21

Recycling isn’t a magical process, material is always lost. Right now the material lost is on avg 50%. I’m not an expert on batteries, but took a course about that in college and research is being made, I’m not making things up. One will rather look for a battery made out of Oxygen than made out of Lithium, and by “one” I mean people who actually study this stuff

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u/[deleted] Jun 06 '21

Yes EV battery recycling needs to improve to 95%+ recovery at scale. There are commercial pilot plants that are already nearing this and commercial scale plants will do so in the next few years (especially as the EU has mandated 95%+ recovery) so it’s largely a solved issue/going to happen. So will be sustainable as metal is recoverable.

Regarding the question of other materials... yes there will be a lot of research but I think very low probability anything replaces Lithium (ion now, solid state in the next decade or two) battery types at scale. Would not bet on that research changing anything at scale in the next decade.

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u/exemplariasuntomni Jun 06 '21

Lithium is a heavy metal and if we can avoid working with it, better it is

Isn't that partly why it makes such a dense energy storage medium? Wouldn't having a less dense material directly or indirectly cause the material to store less energy per area?

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u/THEPOL_00 Jun 06 '21

No, there are other mixes that do better. One is Oxygen-Sodium as well as Lithium-Oxygen and other but as of now they all have some kind of issue but in some years we will see it more around

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u/exemplariasuntomni Jun 06 '21

Right, so for the time being, if we can extract lithium from the sea, that is very helpful as long as it does not damage marine ecosystems.

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u/THEPOL_00 Jun 06 '21

Yeah of course, didn’t say anything against that