L. Garris, T. Madden, N. Anderson
Cool Amps Corp, Connecticut, United States
Keywords: battery-recycling, critical -minerals, NMC, LFP, energy storage
More innovation is required in the lithium-ion battery recycling space due to low profitability, and a dependence on large-scale operations that is threatened by the lack of significant volumes of used electric vehicle battery packs. In short, there currently is no path to profitability or sustainability with traditional recycling methods. Cool Amps has developed a patented process that utilizes the battery architecture itself to facilitate the recovery of valuable materials. This process operates at much higher efficiency and much lower capital and physical footprint. The proposed Cool Amps process can be confined within a laboratory space of 1,000 sq ft. and co-locate at facilities that dispose of lithium-ion batteries. Moreover, the Cool Amps process significantly reduces the largest recycling/reclamation expense– battery acquisition and transport. Furthermore, the Cool Amps recycling process combines benign extraction chemicals with electrochemical methods. To aid its process, Cool Amps has designed a semi-automated Laminar Flow Extraction Module (LFEM) utilizing a safe, proprietary treatment solution to extract valuable lithium battery materials while leaving the battery architecture largely intact. Cool Amps has focused its R&D efforts on cathode metals recovery from intact cylindrical lithium batteries with the nickel-cobalt-manganese (NCM) oxide cathode formulation.