Eco-Friendly Sustainable Lithium Ion Extraction from Aqueous Solutions—Lithium Selective Ceramic Membrane

Global lithium demand is expected to increase from 500,000 tons in 2021 to 2 million tons in 2030, and the lithium shortage is expected to reach 220,000 tons. This dramatic increase in lithium demand is largely due to the widespread use of lithium ion batterie, or electronic devices. In recent years, there has been a global effort to extract lithium ions from dissolved seawater or wastewater. Nevertheless, the extraction of lithium from seawater remains a significant challenge due to its low concentration and abundance of interfering ions. For the selective separation of lithium ions, it is necessary to fabricate membranes with nanochannels that allow only lithium ions to pass through. Our system consist of an anion exchange membrane (AEM) and lithium lanthanum titanium oxide (LLTO) membrane with a perovskite structure. It is a system that consists of three modules and two membranes and selectively extracts only lithium ions by applying a voltage of 5 V. The system produced lithium concentrated solutions with a lithium ion concentration of 10,000 ppm and a lithium selectivity (Li+/Mg2+) of 1000. Lithium phosphate powder with 99.5% purity was fabricated from lithium concentrated solution through a powdering process. The produced lithium phosphate has high purity and can be immediately used for industrial purposes. In addition, it can be fabricated with lithium carbonate and lithium hydroxide by adding an already developed process. It is expected that this system will be used as a supply chain to solve unstable lithium supply.