New US battery leaching method closing in on 100% metals recovery

United States – American Manganese Inc.’s proprietary hydrometallurgical process is able to extract almost 100% of lithium, nickel, manganese, cobalt, and aluminium from rechargeable batteries. This sounds promising, given that the worldwide lithium-ion battery market alone is worth over US$16.5 million a year.

A recent testing programme conducted in collaboration with Kemetco Research has confirmed that all the commonly used rechargeable electric battery cathode materials can be leached using American Manganese Inc.’s special hydrometallurgical process.

‘The valuable metals can then be recovered by either discrete product or co-product precipitation, depending on which flowsheet is being used,’ comments Larry Reaugh, president and ceo of American Manganese Inc.

‘The test work is proceeding on schedule and on budget, and the results to-date are in line with our expectations,’ adds Norman Chow, president of Kemetco Research Inc. He expects the patent for this process will be submitted by November of this year.