(Invited) Electroflow: Sustainable Electrochemical Lithium Chemical Production

The demand for lithium has soared in recent years as the adoption of electric vehicles has grown rapidly, and lithium supply will need to grow another ~5x from current day to meet projected demand for lithium in 2030. To keep pace with this exponentially growing demand, novel methods of lithium sourcing are needed. Direct lithium extraction (DLE) from saltwater brines holds promise to unlock the lithium resources needed to power the electric vehicle revolution. Lithium is traditionally sourced via two methods. Open pit hard rock mining is the method which many are familiar with. In this method, rocks are excavated, roasted with sulfuric acid, and the eluent is processed to produce a pure lithium product. This is well known to be environmentally destructive, and it produces larges amounts of waste products. The second method employed to produce lithium chemicals is brine evaporation ponds. In this method, brine is pumped to a surface pond, often multiple acres across, and solar evaporation concentrates the lithium in the brine to the point that it can undergo further processing. This method is extremely land and water intensive, and local residents adjacent to such ponds are increasingly worried about the effects of such methods on local water tables. Electroflow employs a DLE process to convert brine directly into pure, battery grade lithium chemicals via a sustainable electrochemical process. Our electrochemical cell design enables extraction from dilute lithium brine resources with as low as 10 ppm Li, which unlocks huge swaths of new lithium resources across the globe, and specifically in North America. We use lithium-selective electrode materials as the basis for lithium separation from brine solutions, and this allows a new paradigm of DLE processes that have not yet been thoroughly studied. This talk will describe the operation of our technology and explore the impact that it could have at scale.