TY - JOUR
T1 - Dual-channel-ion conductor membrane for low-energy lithium extraction
AU - Ma, Hongyu
AU - Xia, Yun
AU - Wang, Zhouyou
AU - Xu, Tongwen
AU - Simon, George P.
AU - Wang, Huanting
N1 - Funding Information:
This work was supported by the Australian Research Council through Huanting Wang’s Laureate Fellowship (project no. FL200100049). Hongyu Ma acknowledges the support of the Research Training Program scholarship from the Australian government, Monash International Tuition Scholarship and Faculty of Engineering International Postgraduate Research Scholarship from Monash University during his PhD study. The authors thank the technical support from Monash Centre for Electron Microscopy for SEM observations and Dr. Anthony De Girolamo from the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering for gas sorption, XRD, FTIR, ICP-MS, and IC analyses.
Funding Information:
This work was supported by the Australian Research Council through Huanting Wang’s Laureate Fellowship (project no. FL200100049). Hongyu Ma acknowledges the support of the Research Training Program scholarship from the Australian government, Monash International Tuition Scholarship and Faculty of Engineering International Postgraduate Research Scholarship from Monash University during his PhD study. The authors thank the technical support from Monash Centre for Electron Microscopy for SEM observations and Dr. Anthony De Girolamo from the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering for gas sorption, XRD, FTIR, ICP–MS, and IC analyses.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2023 American Chemical Society
PY - 2023/11/14
Y1 - 2023/11/14
N2 - The development of energy-efficient and environmentally friendly lithium extraction techniques is essential to meet the growing global demand for lithium-ion batteries. In this work, a dual-channel ion conductor membrane was designed for a concentration-driven lithium-selective ion diffusion process. The membrane was based on a porous lithium-ion conductor, and its pores were modified with an anion-exchange polymer. Thus, the sintered lithium-ion conductors provided highly selective cation transport channels, and the functionalized nanopores with positive charges enabled the complementary permeation of anions to balance the transmembrane charges. As a result, the dual-channel membrane realized an ultrahigh Li+/Na+ selectivity of ∼1389 with a competitive Li+ flux of 21.6 mmol·m-2·h-1 in a diffusion process of the LiCl/NaCl binary solution, which was capable of further maintaining the high selectivity over 7 days of testing. Therefore, this work demonstrates the great potential of the dual-channel membrane design for high-performing lithium extraction from aqueous resources with low energy consumption and minimal environmental impact.
AB - The development of energy-efficient and environmentally friendly lithium extraction techniques is essential to meet the growing global demand for lithium-ion batteries. In this work, a dual-channel ion conductor membrane was designed for a concentration-driven lithium-selective ion diffusion process. The membrane was based on a porous lithium-ion conductor, and its pores were modified with an anion-exchange polymer. Thus, the sintered lithium-ion conductors provided highly selective cation transport channels, and the functionalized nanopores with positive charges enabled the complementary permeation of anions to balance the transmembrane charges. As a result, the dual-channel membrane realized an ultrahigh Li+/Na+ selectivity of ∼1389 with a competitive Li+ flux of 21.6 mmol·m-2·h-1 in a diffusion process of the LiCl/NaCl binary solution, which was capable of further maintaining the high selectivity over 7 days of testing. Therefore, this work demonstrates the great potential of the dual-channel membrane design for high-performing lithium extraction from aqueous resources with low energy consumption and minimal environmental impact.
KW - dual-channel ion conductor membrane
KW - lithium-ion conductor
KW - lithium-ion separation
KW - nanochannels
KW - selective ion diffusion
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85176973505&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1021/acs.est.3c05935
DO - 10.1021/acs.est.3c05935
M3 - Article
C2 - 37918342
AN - SCOPUS:85176973505
SN - 0013-936X
VL - 57
SP - 17246
EP - 17255
JO - Environmental Science and Technology
JF - Environmental Science and Technology
IS - 45
ER -
