A World Class DLE Platform
As the demand for lithium continues to soar, the need for efficient, low cost, large-scale extraction and refinery solutions is also rising. EnergyX looks to drive the growth of the global lithium industry while making low-carbon technology cheaper, sustainable and more accessible.
LiTAS®
Lithium Ion Transport and Separation (LiTAS®) is EnergyX’s suite of lithium selective and processing mechanisms that incorporates proprietary membranes, solvents and/or adsorbents to improve lithium recovery for existing and new Li-brine resource producers. LiTAS® aims to process lithium “From Brine to Battery”.
Lithium’s unique characteristics provide enhanced performance benefits that are transforming the energy industry. Being a specialty material, cost-effective and time-efficient extraction processes remains the ‘holy grail’ for the EV transition.
Overview
We provide customers the most economical lithium extraction process for their resource, and create sustainable solutions for battery grade lithium material products. EnergyX has designed and patented scalable implementation methods to cut costs and produce the lowest cost lithium in the market From Brine to Battery™.
Direct Lithium Extraction
- Adsorption (AX), primarily used for water treatment and polishing, is the most heavily pursued type of DLE technology.
- Sorbents, which look like spherical beads, adsorb Li molecules preferentially with high recovery rates. Water then releases lithium.
- EnergyX has developed best-in-class sorbents that can handle high temperatures with fast kinetics and long lifecycles.
- Solvent extraction (SX) is the most common separation technology in the entire mining and metals industry.
- EnergyX has developed proprietary SX reagents to perform purification + concentration of brines, capable of generating Li content of up to 60,000 ppm.
- The SX unit operation enables direct conversion of lithium carbonate or hydroxide via membranes.
- Membrane (MX) technology is used in every type of separation globally including agriculture, water desalination, oil & gas, and others.
- EnergyX has developed lithium selective membranes, among others, to separate Li molecules preferentially over impurities.
- MX is used for direct conversion of lithium chloride to lithium hydroxide or Li metal.
Efficiency & Innovation
Initially we built LiTAS® to complement the existing pond infrastructure in a phased approach. Eventually our direct lithium extraction technology will replace the outdated methods of evaporation ponds.
| Selectivity Li vs. Na | Selectivity Li vs. Mg Cl vs. SO4 | Operates at High Salinity | Continuous Process | High Throughput | Complementary to Ponds | Low Power Consumption | No Chemicals Usage | Minimal Fresh Water Required |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| LiTAS® | |||||||||
| Mixed Matrix Membranes | |||||||||
| Adsorption | |||||||||
| Solvent Extraction | |||||||||
| Nanofiltration | |||||||||
| Reverse Osmosis | |||||||||
| Forward Osmosis |
Lithium refinery
Hydroxide
- Direct conversion of Li Brine to battery grade Lithium Hydroxide
- >60% CAPEX & OPEX savings
- Synergy with DLE
- Highest quality without repurification (99.9%+)
Carbonate
- High purity product resulting from high quality DLE concentrate
- Very low brine impurity removal needed
- Only battery grade Lithium Carbonate without repurification
- <50% CAPEX & OPEX
- Low carbon process
Metal
- Brine to anode ready
- Li-metal in a single step
- Greatly simplified and low temperature process
- >80% CAPEX & OPEX reduction