Selective and Efficient Recovery of Lithium from Mother Liquor from Lithium Carbonate Precipitation Process

• Published in: JOM (1989) Vol. 76; no. 9; pp. 5399 - 5407
• Main Authors: Lei, Foguang, Xu, Xiaoyang, Wang, Qiankun, Xie, Hongzhen, Gan, Wen
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York Springer US 01.09.2024; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Adsorption; Aluminum; Boron; Chemical precipitation; Chemistry/Food Science; Chloride; Dosage; Earth Sciences; Energy consumption; Engineering; Environment; Fluorides; Liquor; Lithium; Lithium carbonate; Physics; Raw materials; Reaction time; Recovery; Recycling; Sodium; Sodium phosphate; Solvent extraction processes; Technical Article
• ISSN: 1047-4838; 1543-1851
• DOI: 10.1007/s11837-024-06762-5

Mother liquor obtained from the process of Li 2 CO 3 precipitation contains abundant lithium resources. In this article, sodium phosphate was used as the precipitation agent to selectively recover lithium from the mother liquor. The effects of sodium phosphate dosage, initial pH of the mother liquor, reaction temperature and reaction time on the lithium recovery rate were investigated. The results showed that the lithium recovery rate and final lithium content in the mother liquor reached 93.07% and 98.03 mg/L, respectively, under the optimal conditions, which were determined as follows: sodium phosphate dosage 1, reaction time 120 min and reaction temperature 90°C. The generation process of lithium phosphate is more influenced by kinetics factors than thermodynamics factors. The lithium phosphate obtained from the mother liquor can be returned to the main recycling system or sold as a raw material for producing Li 2 CO 3 and LiOH·H 2 O. The method in this article not only has strong adaptability to the main recycling system of enterprises but also helps to increasing comprehensive lithium recovery rate to improve economic benefit of the enterprises.