Building up strategic reserves of Lithium
An acronym for “Lithium recovery and battery grade materials production from European resources”, Horizon Europe project LiCORNE benefits from an interdisciplinary and complementary consortium, covering the entire value chain. This four-year project, funded by the European Climate, Infrastructure and Environment Executive Agency (CINEA), set out to establish the first ever Lithium (Li) supply chain in Europe, increasing the EU Li processing and refining capacity for the production of battery-grade chemicals from ores, geothermal and continental brines, tailings and off-specification cathode materials (waste).
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The LiCORNE concept – 14 different ground-breaking technologies
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Driven by this new industrial revolution, mainly generated by the electrification of the transport sector, the global demand for Li-ion batteries (LIBs) is expected to increase fourteen-fold by 2030, and by 2050 the battery market could be worth €250 billion/year. Li is one of the key metals used to manufacture all LIB types. |
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Six-month update on progress
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LiCORNE organising its first clustering workshop
Within the 7th edition of the Raw Materials Week, LiCORNE, together with 7 other EU-funded projects, hosted the clustering workshop "Production of raw materials for batteries from European resources".
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Building up strategic reserves of Lithium to ensure the twin transition of the European economy
On 4 October 2022, the project partners – feedstock providers, technology developers and cathode manufacturers, met in San Sebastian to establish future collaborations that will lead the foundations of the first complete and sustainable Li supply chain in Europe.
Read the press release
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Materials supply and characterisation
Work Package 2 (WP2) is dedicated to the characterisation and supply of materials to the R&D activity. Following the first half-year of the project, a variety of materials were sent to lab partners for technology investigation.
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Extraction from concentrates, waste cathode material, ore and tailings
Focusing on mechanochemical (MC) processing, the recovery of high-value components from the cathode waste supplied by UMICORE is planned to be performed within Task 4.3: Reactive milling and aqueous leaching of waste cathode material.
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Recovery as battery-grade chemicals
VITO achieves direct lithium extraction, using the Gas-Diffusion Electrocrystallisation (GDEx) technology. GDEx uses gas-diffusion electrodes to achieve this goal, by producing in-situ the necessary quantities of mild chemicals, which in turn form precipitates containing lithium.
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Battery recycling technologies at a glance/Batterierecycling–Technologien im Überblick
Open access article available in the German publication CITplus (Vol. 26, issue 3), and signed by the KIT research team: Oleksandr Dolotko, Michael Knapp, Helmut Ehrenberg.
Read the publication
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LiCORNE joins the Cluster Hub "Production of raw materials for batteries from European resources"
After the successful workshop hosted within the Raw Materials Week in November 2022, the LiCORNE project, together with other EU-funded initiatives, founded the cluster hub " Production of raw materials for batteries from European resources"- a collaboration-driven community set out to foster the knowledge necessary to drive a more sustainable and circular production of raw materials for the European battery industry.
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EU unveils the Critical Raw Materials Act: The fundamental role of raw materials in driving Europe’s twin digital and green transition
On 16 March 2023, the European Commission proposed a comprehensive set of priority actions to ensure the EU's access to a secure, diversified, affordable and sustainable supply of critical raw materials (CRMs).
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28 August-02 September, Athens
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03-07 September 2023, Frankfurt
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Project partners
Feedstock providers, technology developers and cathode manufacturers
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