Recovery of Manganese from Scrap Batteries of Mobile Phones

Present work is focused on the recovery of Mn as a value added product from the leach liquor of scrap lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) of mobile phones by the method of precipitation. The LIBs were crushed and beneficiated by wet scrubbing method to separate cathodic material, plastic and metallic parts. The cathodic material was found to contain 11.3% Mn, 10% Co, 2.4% Cu and 2.4% Li. The cathodic material was processed for leaching under the optimized condition developed by our group at CSIR-NML. Solvent extraction method was used to extract acid using organic extractant Tris(2-ethylhexyl)amine (TEHA) in order to reduce the consumption of alkali required during precipitation studies. The acid free leach liquor was subjected to purification for removal of Fe, Li, Cu and Co as precipitate at different pH. Systematic precipitation studies were carried in batch and continuous mode to recover Mn as Mn(OH)(2) at pH similar to 10 which was further roasted at 450 degrees C for 4 h to get pure Mn3O4.