Benjamin A. W. Mowbray, Camden Hunt, Kalyn M. Fuelling, Jacqueline Prawira, Khashayar Jafari, Naia Strong, Yet‐Ming Chiang
The production of lithium chemicals needs to increase to meet rising demand for lithium batteries. Spodumene [LiAl(SiO 3 ) 2 ] is an abundant mineral source of lithium, but its extraction is not cost-competitive with brine resources. Current spodumene-refining methods are energy- and waste-intensive, requiring high-temperature roasting (>1000°C) and chemical leaching. We demonstrate a low-temperature, near-zero-waste process that converts α-spodumene into battery-grade lithium carbonate (Li 2 CO 3 ), smelter-grade alumina (Al 2 O 3 ), and cementitious silica (SiO 2 ). Aqueous ammonium fluoride (NH 4 F) is used as the reagent to solubilize the mineral feedstock at <100°C in a closed-loop process that regenerates the reagent. Techno-economic analysis indicates that this approach may reduce the cost of producing lithium from α-spodumene by >40% and enable cost parity with brines.