Lithium dedicated adsorbent for the preparation of electrodes useful in the ion pumping method

In this paper, our studies on the extraction of lithium using a new desalination technology are presented. The combination of capacitive deionization with ion pumping batteries resulted in the hybrid CDI process. Hybrid CDI was composed by an electrode prepared from inorganic adsorbents (blended manganese and titanium oxides) and a counter electrode made of activated carbon. The structure and porosity of the adsorbents were investigated by SEM, XRD and BET analyses, while the pore size distribution was calculated according to the QSDFT model. The adsorbent with the best electrochemical performance was manganese oxide with a 5% content of titanium dioxide. It was characterized by enhanced electron conductivity and a structure that offers the highest hybrid CDI adsorption capacity for lithium. This material was used to build a negatively polarized electrode of the hybrid system that allowed similar to 36 mg/g sorption capacity for LiCl to be reached. The uptake of KCl and NaCl was 16 mg/g and 11 mg/g, respectively. Additionally, the best adsorbent was characterized by a 2 times smaller consumption of energy needed to extract lithium chloride in comparison to other monovalent salts.