Lithium battery pure water requirements

Schomberg et al. (2021) performed life cycle water scarcity footprint of lithium-ion battery storage and the supply chain associated with its production. The authors explored multiple mining locations where the lithium needed to produce the battery storage is sourced.

Humidity plays a dominant role in the quality and stability of batteries. Most batteries require water-free electrolytes, because water can be electrolyzed to give H2 and O2 gases that can cause the battery to explode.7 Therefore, to ensure product quality and safety, low water content is one of the key requirements for LiBs.

Water in LIBs which were constructed with anode, cathode and organic electrolyte containing lithium salts can degrade the cell performance and seriously damage the materials present.

Our research shows that the concentrated lithium brine production mainly contributes to the water footprint of lithium battery grade products among the operations requiring direct water use due to the direct water consumption during the process stage and the use of relatively high scarcity impact CFs.

The results demonstrate that for all of the processes, the blue water use with a total of 107 t per lithium product is greater compared to the blue water consumption (18.7 t per lithium product) due to the fact that the use depicts the total amount of water entering the product system.

During the concentrated lithium brine production, 4.5 m 3 of groundwater was used while the Li 2 CO 3 production and LiOH production process steps require 7.5 m 3 desalinated water. Other material inputs consist of quick lime, sodium carbonate, sulfuric acid, sodium hydroxide, hydrochloric acid and diatomite.