this post was submitted on 14 Apr 2026
949 points (99.8% liked)

Technology

83799 readers
3063 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.

Our Rules

  1. Follow the lemmy.world rules.
  2. Only tech related news or articles.
  3. Be excellent to each other!
  4. Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
  5. Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
  6. Politics threads may be removed.
  7. No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
  8. Only approved bots from the list below, this includes using AI responses and summaries. To ask if your bot can be added please contact a mod.
  9. Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
  10. Accounts 7 days and younger will have their posts automatically removed.

Approved Bots

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
L3s@lemmy.world
enu@lemmy.world
technopagan@lemmy.world
L4s@lemmy.world
L3s@hackingne.ws
949
Japan finds a way to recover 90% of lithium from old EV batteries (www.techspot.com)
submitted 1 day ago by Argyle13@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world
101 comments fedilink hide all child comments
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] tgf@lemmy.world 208 points 1 day ago (3 children)

"The process starts with old batteries being separated and burned to strip away non-metal components. What's left gets crushed into something called black mass. This is essentially a powder packed with recoverable metals. From there, a water-based chemical treatment called hydrometallurgy pulls the lithium out. One clever distinction in this new process is that the recovered lithium hydroxide actually replaces a chemical traditionally used during refining. This cuts the carbon footprint by about 40% compared to older methods."

Article also said that previous methods got about 45% of the lithium from recycling.

[–] prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 49 points 1 day ago (4 children)

black mass

Pretty metal

[–] Crozekiel@lemmy.zip 2 points 7 hours ago

Lithium can be a pretty metal, but I'm not sure it looks its best in this state.

[–] TerdFerguson@lemmy.world 7 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

HAIL SATAN

[–] kamen@lemmy.world 2 points 12 hours ago

WORSHIP DOOM

[–] Deceptichum@quokk.au 16 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Generals gathered in their masses
Just like witches at black masses
Evil minds that plot destruction
Sorcerer of death's construction

[–] null@lemmy.org 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Brutal

[–] anomnom@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 day ago

But still lithe.

[–] renzhexiangjiao@piefed.blahaj.zone 74 points 1 day ago

seems like a significant breakthrough

[–] ericatty 5 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Dumb question... how are they burning them? I thought controlling lithium battery fires was difficult?

[–] brygphilomena@lemmy.dbzer0.com 25 points 1 day ago

They are hard to put out, but if you want them to burn all you really need is a safe place to do it. So in a big crucible with some type of fume extraction so they aren't crazy polluting the air. As long as the heat has somewhere safe to go and there isn't anything else to catch on fire, burning things is easy.