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posted by Fnord666 on Monday February 12 2018, @10:35PM   Printer-friendly
from the already-in-Texas-doe-the-patent-dispute dept.

Submitted via IRC for Bytram

With continual technological advancements in mobile devices and electric cars, the global demand for lithium has quickly outpaced the rate at which it can be mined or recycled, but a University of Texas at Austin professor and his research team may have a solution.

Benny Freeman, professor in the McKetta Department of Chemical Engineering in the Cockrell School of Engineering, and his colleagues at the Monash University Department of Chemical Engineering and the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) in Australia have recently discovered a new, efficient way to extract lithium and other metals and minerals from water. They published their findings in the Feb. 9 issue of Science Advances.

The team's technique uses a metal-organic-framework membrane that mimics the filtering function, or "ion selectivity," of biological cell membranes. The membrane process easily and efficiently separates metal ions, opening the door to revolutionary technologies in the water and mining industries and potential economic growth opportunities in Texas.

[...] In addition, the team's process could help with water desalination. Unlike the existing reverse-osmosis membranes responsible for more than half of the world's current water desalination capacity, the new membrane process dehydrates ions as they pass through the membrane channels and removes only select ions, rather than indiscriminately removing all ions. The result is a process that costs less and consumes less energy than conventional methods.

See also: http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aaq0066

Source: https://news.utexas.edu/2018/02/09/new-lithium-collection-method-could-boost-global-supply


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  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by frojack on Tuesday February 13 2018, @12:57AM (4 children)

    by frojack (1554) on Tuesday February 13 2018, @12:57AM (#636914) Journal

    Didn't we have an article recently stating that the world wide supply of lithium was vast and more than enough to handle all the demand?

    I think it had something to do with Musk's giga factory.

    Battery University [batteryuniversity.com] has an article stating that rumors of supply problems are premature, and Chinese hording is suspected. Most of the known supply of lithium is in Bolivia, Argentina, Chile, Australia and China. Most other places have supplies, but haven't bothered to mine it because the price of lithium is too cheep. Bloomberg agrees [bloomberg.com].

    If all it takes is a higher price to get it out of the ground, that's a good thing.

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  • (Score: 0, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 13 2018, @01:17AM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 13 2018, @01:17AM (#636917)

    A rising price for lithium sends the signal that it might be profitable to expand mining, or indeed to research new ways to perform mining.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 13 2018, @01:26AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 13 2018, @01:26AM (#636920)

      Stating yourself, Captain Obvious?

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 13 2018, @03:05AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 13 2018, @03:05AM (#636948)

    A rising price for lithium sends the signal that it might be profitable to expand mining, or indeed to research new ways to perform mining.

  • (Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Tuesday February 13 2018, @03:30AM

    by fustakrakich (6150) on Tuesday February 13 2018, @03:30AM (#636959) Journal

    If all it takes is a higher price to get it out of the ground, that's a good thing.

    That is all it takes... We have proven over and over that with enough money we can do anything. The better option is make the process cheaper, probably through automation, like tunnel boring, and mobile furnaces on the back end. This "distillation" thing is good. You can get all sorts of other stuff while you're at it [stanford.edu]. Reducing human effort is the goal. The price should follow.

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