Inorganic Chemicals Industry ›› 2020, Vol. 52 ›› Issue (12): 1-6.doi: 10.11962/1006-4990.2020-0051

• Reviews and Special Topics •     Next Articles

Research progress on separation and extraction of lithium from salt-lake brine

Wu Jing(),Ren Xiulian,Wei Qifeng()   

  1. School of Marine Science and Technology,Harbin Institute of Technology of Weihai,Weihai 264200,China
  • Received:2020-06-24 Online:2020-12-10 Published:2020-12-15
  • Contact: Wei Qifeng E-mail:1205207547@qq.com;weiqifeng163@163.com

Abstract:

Since the explosive growth of new energy vehicles in 2015,the demand for lithium has increased rapidly in the world.Therefore,it is of great significance to accelerate the development of lithium resources. Lithium resources in China are quite abundant,mainly existing in lithium ore and salt lake brine,and salt lake brine is the main source. With the significant advantages of low energy consumption and low cost,lithium extraction from brine has become an important direction for obtaining lithium resources in the future. The existing methods of extracting lithium from brine were summarized,and the extraction method,adsorption method,membrane separation method and electrochemical method that currently being studied were expounded emphafically.At present,FeCl3-diluent is still used as extraction system in most extraction methods.The types of extractants and diluents were studied primarily.In the adsorption method,adsorbents are the key to the experiment.In recent years,aluminum-based adsorbents and ionic sieve adsorbents have become the focus of research,How to granulate and how to reduce the dissolution loss rate will become the main research direction in the future.In membrane separation,the key of the two methods is to improve the adsorption capacity,and nanofiltration and electrodialysis in membrane separation method are relatively mature.As for electrochemical lithium extraction,researchers proposed to use different adsorbents as electrode materials to significantly improve the lithium extraction effect.The rise of electrochemical lithium extraction method provides a new idea for lithium extraction from brine.

Key words: salt-lake brine, lithium, extraction, ion screen adsorption, nanofiltration, electrodialysis, the electrochemistry

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