The Technology of extracting Lithium from Salt Lake by Electrochemical de-intercalation in Central and South China Lithium Industry promotes the Green, efficient and economical extraction and Utilization of Global Salt Lake Lithium Resources

New energy market

The global policy orientation is clear, and "carbon neutralization" has become a major trend.

In 2020, the COVID-19 epidemic caused huge social and economic uncertainty around the world. in a short period of time, the world economy may contract much more than the previous financial crisis because of the impact of the novel coronavirus epidemic.

Under such a situation, in the new energy market, Europe, China and other global leading economies not only did not compromise on their carbon emissions targets because of the significant impact of the novel coronavirus epidemic, but clearly set green recovery as the main theme and become the main starting point of economic recovery in the post-epidemic era.

In his speech at the general debate of the 75th session of the United Nations General Assembly on September 22, 2020, President Xi Jinping of the people's Republic of China mentioned that under the general direction of global green and low-carbon transformation, all countries must take decisive steps. China will increase its national independent contribution and adopt stronger policies and measures to peak carbon dioxide emissions by 2030 and strive to achieve carbon neutrality by 2060.

On October 20, 2020, the General Office of the State Council issued the Development Plan of New Energy vehicle Industry (2021-2025), which proposed that by 2025, the sales of new energy vehicles in China will reach about 20% of the total sales of new cars.

On February 8, 2021, at an online briefing on the preparations for the 26th Conference of the parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate change, United Nations Secretary-General Guterres once again urged countries to accelerate the achievement of carbon neutrality.

ESG requirements of supply chain for Lithium extraction from Salt Lake are increasing

As the upstream of the new energy industry chain, the importance of lithium salt production market is self-evident. At the global resource supply end, some ore lithium merchants actively and passively reduce and stop production in 2020, at the same time, due to the impact of the epidemic on the capacity construction progress of South American salt lakes, in the post-epidemic era, lithium salt production increment will come more from salt lakes to extract lithium.

In October 2020, SQM, a global salt lake lithium extraction giant based in Chile, unveiled ESG sustainable development plans to reduce terrestrial fresh water consumption, reduce carbon emissions and reduce brine extraction. Another leading company, Albemarle, also said it was looking for ways to produce more lithium from the same amount of brine.

In May 2020, Wechat, official of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, reported that the Central sixth Eco-Environmental Protection Supervision and Inspection team reported that some localities and departments need to strengthen the overall planning and layout for the utilization and protection of salt lake resources. it is necessary to strengthen the protection of the natural ecology of rivers and lakes.

Cristobal de La Maza, head of Chile's environmental regulator SMA, said Chile needs to be competitive not only in production, but also in environmental standards, and in an era of sustainable development, production needs to mitigate its impact on fragile ecosystems and local communities.

Based on the sustainable development plan released by SQM, for the lithium extraction industry, we can get a glimpse of the whole leopard, the future lithium extraction needs to be more in line with the "green heart" of the global development of new energy industry, carbon neutralization and other goals have begun to affect the overall process design and direction choice.

Naturally, this also puts forward higher requirements and expectations for the innovation of lithium extraction technology. With the implementation experience of previous projects, it needs to be fully demonstrated in reducing the salt field area, shortening the brine drying cycle, optimizing the technological process, improving the overall recovery rate, and so on. At the same time, it varies according to the lake and measures to local conditions, so as to reduce energy consumption and fresh water consumption as much as possible, so as to avoid formalism in energy saving and environmental protection.

To promote the green, efficient and economical extraction and utilization of lithium resources in global salt lakes.

The technology of extracting lithium from salt lake by electrochemical de-intercalation method possessed by Zhongnan lithium industry can not only fully cover the resources of salt lakes all over the world, but also creatively integrate the "separation, extraction and concentration" of lithium, which greatly simplifies the production process.

Aiming at the low, medium and high grade salt lake resources, electrochemical deintercalation technology can extract lithium from raw brine, and there is no addition or production of dangerous substances in the production process of electric deintercalation, so the brine after lithium extraction can be returned directly to the salt lake. it will not cause any waste of water resources, pollution or other environmental damage problems.

Based on the high quality output of electric de-intercalation technology, the solution of extracting lithium from salt lake in Zhongnan lithium industry has many process directions and high selectivity. For some existing salt lake lithium extraction projects, the electric de-intercalation technology can improve the comprehensive recovery rate, shorten the production cycle and greatly increase the lithium salt production capacity through small investment and front-end process implantation without affecting potash products. break through the limit of old brine production capacity.

For newly built capacity projects, electric de-intercalation technology has second to none advantages in terms of investment scale and production cost. at the same time, because of its metallogenic characteristics, most of the salt lake lithium resources are located in high-altitude areas where the global infrastructure is relatively weak. Zhongnan lithium industry targeted put forward a "electric de-intercalation evaporation concentration" process route, which can greatly reduce unit energy consumption, production cost and highly simplified process. And in the choice of end products, it also provides a multi-stage solution of "lithium phosphate and lithium hydroxide".

Zhongnan Lithium Industry has established a headquarters base integrating R & D, testing and production in Liyang City, Jiangsu Province. At present, the complete set of equipment for the industrialization of electrochemical de-intercalation and the industrialization of back-end to battery-grade lithium carbonate products have been completed, and can meet the needs of batch industrialization.

The demonstration line covers the standardized "electric de-embedding membrane concentration process" route, "electric de-intercalation evaporation concentration" route, and the multi-stage comprehensive solution route of the end product "lithium phosphate and lithium hydroxide". It can be used to demonstrate the on-site process of salt lake resources with different endowments around the world.

Jiangsu Zhongnan lithium industry, adhering to the business philosophy of "superb technology, excellent products and sincere service", actively responds to the national and even global concept of "carbon peak and carbon neutralization" with strong technical background and strict international standards. support the development of the global new energy industry "positive cycle", continue to provide customers with better products and technical support, and strive to become a global salt lake lithium extraction industry leader.