Since lithium-ion battery was introduced onto the market by Sony Corp, it has been widely used as power sources in portable electronic applications, electric vehicles (EVs) and stationary storage of renewable energies. As the most popular storage technology of energy storage, it is predicted that the global lithium battery market demand in 2025 will reach $99.98 billion, and the shipment volume will be 439.32 GWh. In the near future, considering the need for effective use of these limited resources (Co, Li, etc.), environmental sustainability, retiring of the current generation of LIBs will create an urgent need to recycle. It is predicted that by 2030 the global LIB recycling market will reach $23.72 billion.

How do we recycle the Li-ion batteries？

The above scheme is a comprehensive illustration of the latest advances in LIBs recycling field [2]. So far, there are two topics we work on. One is on discharge process, which we try to develop novel discharge materials and methods to meet commercialization. Another one is on all types of cathode material recycling by hydrometallurgy process, and how do we scale up the process.