Name of the project: Material recycling of lithium-ion batteries

Project refference number: VEGA 1/0556/20

Principal investigator: doc. Ing. Dušan Oráč, PhD.

Anotation: The project addresses the issue of comprehensive recycling of lithium batteries from the automotive industry, IT and telecommunications technologies. The use of lithium batteries is growing and their market share will increase with the gradual arrival of hybrid and electric vehicles. Material recycling has become one of the three pillars of EU raw materials policy in recent years. At the same time, the principles of the circular economy place great emphasis on the last part, which is recycling. Lithium batteries are a valuable secondary raw material that contains metals such as lithium, cobalt or nickel, the content of which is higher compared to the primary raw material. The aim of the project is a comprehensive processing of lithium batteries by hydrometallurgical processing on a laboratory and pilot plant scale, to design and test technologies of complete material recycling. Given the quantities and chemical composition, it is possible to estimate the financial benefit after the industrial application of the achieved results of the project in Slovakia in the amount of 2.3 million US $.