Recycling Technology of Waste Lithium Batteries

Lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) are key components in new energy vehicles, portable electronic devices, energy storage systems, and other fields due to their advantages of high energy density, long cycle life, and no memory effect. However, the wide application of Li-ion batteries has also brought about a problem that cannot be ignored. The number of used lithium-ion batteries has increased dramatically. Globally, the number of lithium-ion batteries scrapped each year has reached a staggering scale, which is still growing at an alarming rate. At the same time, with the popularity of smartphones, tablet PCs, laptops, and other electronic products and the speed of replacement, the lithium-ion batteries used in these devices are also facing the problem of decommissioning and disposal. The accumulation and improper disposal of used lithium-ion batteries not only occupy a large amount of land resources, exacerbate the pressure of municipal waste disposal, but also pose a potential threat to the ecological environment. Therefore, this paper summarises the current recycling technologies of used lithium-ion batteries, mainly involving the recovery of positive and negative materials, aiming to solve the occurrence of these problems.