Closed-Loop Utilization of Molten Salts in Layered Material Preparation for Lithium-Ion Batteries

Abstract

Molten-salt assisted solid-state synthesis is considered a promising method in obtaining layer-structured cathodes for lithium-ion batteries with homogeneous elemental distribution and controllable morphologies. However, drawbacks like resource wasting which have arisen from redundant salt removal after sintering greatly hinder the broader application of this technique. In this paper, a closed-loop utilization of molten salts is proposed for the first time with specific electrochemical properties of the products studied. Results confirm the feasibility of this strategy, and that with only replenishing LiOH, the recycled LiOH-LiCl molten salts can be successfully reused into another LiNi0.5Co0.2Mn0.3O2 synthesis, which exhibits almost equal electrochemical performance to the product using fresh molten salts. We believe this research can provide significant insight in guiding green and environmental-friendly preparation methods involving molten salts.