TY - JOUR
T1 - Lithium recovery through WS2 nanofillers-promoted solar photothermal membrane crystallization of LiCl
AU - Santoro, Sergio
AU - Aquino, Marco
AU - Rizza, Carlo
AU - Occhiuzzi, Jessica
AU - Mastrippolito, Dario
AU - D'Olimpio, Gianluca
AU - Avci, Ahmet H.
AU - De Santis, Jessica
AU - Paolucci, Valentina
AU - Ottaviano, Luca
AU - Lozzi, Luca
AU - Ronen, Avner
AU - Bar-Sadan, Maya
AU - Han, Dong Suk
AU - Politano, Antonio
AU - Curcio, Efrem
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2022
PY - 2023/1/15
Y1 - 2023/1/15
N2 - The recovery of raw materials represents one of the greatest challenges for a circular economy. Especially, the increased demand for lithium in the last years for its critical role in Li-ion batteries implies the need for green technology for Li recovery able to address market requests. Here, we devise and implement a new technology exploiting excitons-based light-to-heat conversion promoted by WS2 nanofillers in nanocomposite polymeric membranes for sunlight-driven photothermal membrane crystallization, applied for the efficient extraction of lithium from Li-rich brines. The activation of photothermal effects of excitonic nanofillers in the PVDF-WS2 nanocomposite enhances the evaporative flux of water under solar irradiation by 364 %, triggering the heterogeneous nucleation and the crystallization of LiCl salt, once achieved supersaturation. This new facile, economical, and green nanotechnology-enabled platform renews the interest in functional inks based on nanosheets of van der Waals semiconductors for the fabrication of functional nanocomposites, here exploited for the first time in the field of crystallization and the recovery of economically strategic minerals in a circular-economy paradigm. Moreover, these findings open up new opportunities for large-scale, efficient, and sustainable recovery of lithium (as well as other critical raw materials) for next-generation devices for the clean energy transition.
AB - The recovery of raw materials represents one of the greatest challenges for a circular economy. Especially, the increased demand for lithium in the last years for its critical role in Li-ion batteries implies the need for green technology for Li recovery able to address market requests. Here, we devise and implement a new technology exploiting excitons-based light-to-heat conversion promoted by WS2 nanofillers in nanocomposite polymeric membranes for sunlight-driven photothermal membrane crystallization, applied for the efficient extraction of lithium from Li-rich brines. The activation of photothermal effects of excitonic nanofillers in the PVDF-WS2 nanocomposite enhances the evaporative flux of water under solar irradiation by 364 %, triggering the heterogeneous nucleation and the crystallization of LiCl salt, once achieved supersaturation. This new facile, economical, and green nanotechnology-enabled platform renews the interest in functional inks based on nanosheets of van der Waals semiconductors for the fabrication of functional nanocomposites, here exploited for the first time in the field of crystallization and the recovery of economically strategic minerals in a circular-economy paradigm. Moreover, these findings open up new opportunities for large-scale, efficient, and sustainable recovery of lithium (as well as other critical raw materials) for next-generation devices for the clean energy transition.
KW - Energy transition
KW - Lithium recovery
KW - Photothermal membrane crystallization
KW - Photothermal nanosheets
KW - Water-energy-raw materials nexus
U2 - 10.1016/j.desal.2022.116186
DO - 10.1016/j.desal.2022.116186
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85141243999
SN - 0011-9164
VL - 546
JO - Desalination
JF - Desalination
M1 - 116186
ER -