• Resources Recycling
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• v.32 no.1
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• pp.13-20
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• 2023

The objective of this article is to summarize the commercial lithium ion battery (LIB) recycling processes in Korea and to suggest new direction for LIB recycling. A representative LIB recycler, SungEel Hitech Co. has successfully operated the LIB recycling process for over 10 years, and new recycling processes were recently proposed or developed by many recycling companies and battery manufacturers. In the new recycling processes, lithium is recovered before nickel and cobalt due to the rapid rise in lithium prices, and metal sulfate solution as final product of recycling process can be supplied to manufacturers. The main problem that the new recycling process will face is impurities, which will mainly come from end-of-life electric vehicles or new additives in LIB, although the conventional processes must be improved for mass processing.

• Journal of the Korean Electrochemical Society
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• v.4 no.2
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• pp.77-81
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• 2001

Recently, used batteries are causing an environmental contamination and a waste of limited resources with increasing demand of portable secondary batteries in market. In developed countries, their governments have legally required the manufacture to collect and recycle the used batteries, so the related companies have formed an organization for collecting the used batteries and they are effectively recycling them. Unfortunately, an infrastructure for collecting and recycling the used batteries are not established at home yet, while volume of the used batteries are increasing. Therefore, we need an effective measure to ensure the recycling of the used batteries as soon as possible.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.19 no.9
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• pp.326-332
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• 2018

Korea faces major changes in energy policy, which include eco-friendly and zero-nuclear power. On the other hand, there are very few policies for the waste-management of mid- to large-sized lithium-ion batteries, such as electric car batteries and energy storage systems, which are expected to increase explosively due to such energy policy changes. Therefore, this study estimated the amount of mid- to large-sized lithium ion batteries waste and performed economics analysis of a middle and large sized secondary battery recycling project. Based on the results, a policy alternative for the revitalization of the related lithium-ion battery recycling industry is suggested. As a result, the B / C ratio of a domestic mid - to large - sized lithium ion battery recycling project is 1.06, in which the benefit is higher than the cost, so the business is economic feasible. Although the recycling project's economic efficiency is high, the recycling industry has not been activated in Korea because the domestic demand for rechargeable batteries recycling is very low. To solve this problem, this study proposes a plan to activate the industry by adding lithium secondary batteries to the EPR (Extended Producer Responsibility) items.

• Resources Recycling
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.27-39
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• 2022

The global demand for lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) has been continuously increasing since the 1990s along with the growth of the portable electronic device market. Of late, the rapid growth of the electric vehicle market has further accelerated the demand for LIBs. The demand for the LIBs is expected to surpass the supply of lithium from natural resources in the near future, posing a risk to the global lithium supply chain. Moreover, the continuous accumulation of end-of-life LIBs is expected to cause serious environmental problems. To solve these problems, recycling the spent LIBs must be viewed as a critical technological challenge that must be urgently addressed. In this study, recycling LIBs using pyrometallurgical processes and post-processes for efficient lithium recovery are briefly reviewed along with the major accomplishments in the field and current challenges.

• Resources Recycling
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• v.33 no.2
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• pp.24-36
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• 2024

The lithium-ion battery recycling process has been classified into direct recycling, hydrometallurgical process, and pyrometallurgical process. The commercial process based on the hydrometallurgical process produces black mass through pretreatment processes consisting of dismantling, crushing and grinding, heat treatment, and beneficiation, and then each metal is recovered by hydrometallurgical processes. Since all lithium-ion battery recycling processes under development conducts hydrometallurgical processes such as leaching, after the pretreatment process, to produce precursor raw materials, this article suggests a classification method according to the pretreatment method of the recycling process. The processes contain sulfation roasting, carbothermic reduction roasting, and alloy manufacturing, and the economic feasibility of the lithium-ion battery recycling process can be enhanced using unused by-products in the pretreatment process.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2012.02a
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• pp.349-349
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• 2012

박막형 GaAs 계 III-V 태양전지는 ELO (Epitaxy Lift-off) 기술에 의하여 기판으로부터 분리되어 얻어질 수 있다. 지금까지 이 기술에 대해 개발된 결과에 의하면 박막 III-V 태양전지의 효율이 기존 기판 기반의 태양전지 효율과 비슷한 수준을 얻고 있으며, 기판의 재활용, 플렉서블, 및 신축성 태양전지로의 적용분야 등의 보고들도 발표되고 있어 실리콘 태양전지가 접근하기 힘든 특정한 응용분야로의 가능성을 밝게 해주고 있다. 그러나, 이 ELO방식에 의한 박막형 III-V 태양전지가 실질적으로 상업화 되기 위해서는 생산 수율의 개선 및 기판 재활용 시의 저손실 등 해결해야 할 당면과제들이 놓여 있다. 기판재활용의 가능성을 위해 아직까지 발표된 셀의 크기는 $2{\times}2mm^2$ 이하이며, 보다 넓은 셀에 대하여 기판재활용 방식으로 재생된 효율을 갖는 III-V 박막 태양전지는 보고된 바 없다. 본 연구에서는, $1{\times}1mm^2$, $2{\times}2mm^2$, 그리고 $5{\times}5mm^2$에 대하여 ELO 에 의한 박막 태양전지를 제작해 보고, 보다 넓은 면의 박막 태양전지를 효율적으로 제작하기 위한 방법을 연구하고자 한다. 또한, 이 셀들을 유연한 PDMS transfer에 부착하여 플렉서블 태양전지로의 가능성에 대해서도 기술하고자 한다. 사용된 박막 태양전지 구조는 한국광기술원에서 제작한 22% GaAs 단일 접합 태양전지와 같은 구조로 되어 있으며, 희생층으로는 AlGaAs 층을 사용하였고, ELO을 위한 에칭용 홀 지름은 5, 10, 그리고 $20{\mu}m$에 대하여 조사하였다.

• Journal of the Institute of Electronics Engineers of Korea SC
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• v.46 no.6
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• pp.21-27
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• 2009

As portable electronic systems being used more often, it becomes a more important issue to lengthen the lifetime of the power battery of the system, for instance, by developing batteries of a higher efficiency. A simple as well as practical method to lengthen the lifetime is to use multiple batteries that are connected in parallel. But in this paper we present a new idea in using multiple batteries, with which the residual energy of the battery can be used in the sense of recycling. The idea is based on a usual phenomenon that a battery cell that has been used until its voltage has dropped below a reference level may still have some residual energy, due to which the voltage can recover when the cell takes a rest for a while. As a practical realization scheme of this idea, a multi-cell configuration method with a cell selection switch is introduced, and its feasibility has been examined by performing experimental observations on the behavior of battery discharge. It has been found that the lifetime of an Alkaline primary battery cell can be lengthened approximately by one or two hours with the proposed method.

• Resources Recycling
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• v.21 no.4
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• pp.16-25
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• 2012

There are several kinds of batteries such as zinc-air battery, lithium battery, Manganese dry battery, silver oxide battery, sodium-sulphur battery, lead acid battery, metal hydride secondary battery, nickel-cadmium battery, lithium ion battery, alkaline battery, etc. These days it has been widely studied for the recycling technologies of the used battery from view points of economy and efficiency. In this paper, patents and published papers on the recycling technologies of the used battery were analyzed. The range of search was limited in the open patents of USA (US), European Union (EU), Japan (JP), Korea (KR) and SCI journal articles from 1972 to 2011. Patents and journal articles were collected using key-words searching and filtered by filtering criteria. The trends of the patents and journal articles were analyzed by the years, countries, companies, and technologies.

• Proceedings of the KSEEG Conference
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• 2001.04a
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• pp.311-314
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• 2001

• Resources Recycling
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• v.16 no.3 s.77
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• pp.50-60
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• 2007

There are several kinds of battery such as zinc-air battery, lithium battery, Manganese dry battery, silver oxide battery, mercury battery, sodium-sulphur battery, lead battery, nickel-hydrogen secondary battery, nickel-cadmium battery, lithium ion battery, alkaline battery, etc. These days it has been widely studied for the recycling technologies of the used battery from view points of economy and efficiency. In this paper, patents on the recycling technologies of the used lithium battery were analyzed. The range of search was limited in the open patents of USA(US), European Union(EP), Japan(JP), and Korea(KR) from 1986 to 2006. Patents were collected using key-words searching and filtered by filtering criteria. The trends of the patents was analyzed by the years, countries, companies, and technologies.