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Postgraduate research project

Clean and cheap lithium production using electrochemistry

Funding
Fully funded (UK only)
Type of degree
Doctor of Philosophy
Entry requirements
2:1 honours degree View full entry requirements
Faculty graduate school
Faculty of Engineering and Physical Sciences
Closing date

About the project

We're developing the sustainable production of lithium from geothermal waters in Cornwall (UK), with the purpose of securing the supply of materials for the manufacture of batteries for electric vehicles. 

The boom in the global lithium battery market cannot be sustained with current methods of lithium production, which can only be applied in limited locations in the world and have a significant carbon impact.

Producing lithium at a competitive cost and with minimal impact to the environment is a big challenge, however, and this project will investigate new electrochemical approaches to achieve this. 

Building on our experience on electrochemical lithium production and materials’ innovation we will exploit the selectivity of battery materials towards lithium to preferentially extract lithium ions from lithium resources (e.g. geothermal waters) that contain other ions (e.g. sodium) in vast excess.

Protective coatings and novel nanostructured materials will be developed to achieve the long-term stability required for commercial applications, and novel cell designs and electrochemical approaches will be developed to take advantage of the thermal energy of geothermal waters to accelerate the reactions.

The project will culminate with the demonstration of the new technology at mini-pilot scale at Cornish Lithium facilities.

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