Mixed hydroxide precipitate

Example

See it in the plant

1. Precipitate: alkali is added to 5544 kg of solution until manganese, cobalt and nickel come out together as hydroxides.
2. Filter: the solid is the mixed hydroxide precipitate, 7664 kg dry. It still has to be refined before precursor production.
3. Pass on: lithium stays dissolved; 586 kg of raffinate goes to lithium recovery, and 127 kg is bled off to keep sodium and sulfate in check.

Use in Lemonergy

Distinguish recovered material from a qualified product.

This is a reference concept. No executable Lemonergy block has been verified for this term.

Connected concepts

Related concepts from the knowledge graph. Connections show context, not cause and effect. Hover or focus a linked term for its definition.

Nickel sulfate

The battery-grade nickel chemical fed to precursor plants, made from high-purity class 1 nickel or increasingly from Indonesian laterite ore by high-pressure acid leaching. It is the largest cost in a high-nickel cathode.

Precipitation

Recovering a dissolved metal as a solid by adding a reagent that makes it insoluble — nickel and cobalt as hydroxides, lithium as carbonate with sodium carbonate. Co-precipitating nickel, manganese and cobalt together gives a precursor directly.

Precursor cathode active material

The mixed nickel–manganese–cobalt hydroxide made by co-precipitation from metal sulfate solutions, before lithium is added. Its particle size and shape are set here and carried through to the finished NMC powder.

Solvent extraction

Separating metals in the leach liquor by contacting it with an organic phase carrying an extractant that picks up one metal at a time, controlled by pH: manganese, then cobalt, then nickel, leaving lithium in the water. It is how recyclers reach battery-grade sulfates.

References & further reading

Further reading on this topic

These sources provide broader context; they are not presented as citations for every statement in this entry.

1. Lithium-Ion Battery Recycling

   U.S. Environmental Protection Agency

   Topic background · Battery construction, recycling routes and U.S. waste-management context.

2. Recycling lithium-ion batteries from electric vehicles

   Gavin Harper et al. · Nature · 2019

   Topic background · Reuse, disassembly and mechanical, hydro-, pyro- and direct recycling routes.