Among existing and emerging technologies to recycle spent lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) from electric vehicles, pyrometallurgical processes are commercially used. However, very little is known about their environmental and energy impacts. In this study, three pyrometallurgical technologies are analyzed and compared in terms of global warming potential (GWP) and cumulative energy demand (CED), namely: an emerging direct current (DC) plasma smelting technology (Sc-1), the same DC plasma technology but with an additional pre-treatment stage (Sc-2), and a more commercially mature ultra-high temperature (UHT) furnace (Sc-3). The net impacts for the recovered metals are calculated using both “open-loop” and “closed-loop” recycling options. Results reveal that shifting from the UHT furnace technology (Sc-3) to the DC plasma technology could reduce the GWP of the recycling process by up to a factor of 5 (when employing pre-treatment, as is the case with Sc-2). Results also vary across factors, for example, different metal recovery rates, carbon/energy intensity of the electricity grid (in Sc-1 and Sc-2), rates of aluminum recovery (in Sc-2), and sources of coke (in Sc-3). However, the sensitivity analysis showed that these factors do not change the best option which was determined before (as Sc-2) except in a few cases for CED. Overall, the research methodology and application presented by this life cycle assessment informs future energy and environmental impact assessment studies that want to assess existing recycling processes of LIB or other emerging technologies. This article met the requirements for a gold–silver JIE data openness badge described at http://jie.click/badges.

中文翻译：

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使用火法冶金技术对锂离子电池回收的生命周期评估

在从电动汽车回收废旧锂离子电池 (LIB) 的现有和新兴技术中，火法冶金工艺已被商业化使用。然而，人们对它们对环境和能源的影响知之甚少。本研究从全球变暖潜势（GWP）和累积能量需求（CED）两个方面对三种火法冶金技术进行了分析和比较，即：新兴的直流（DC）等离子熔炼技术（Sc-1），相同的直流等离子技术，但具有额外的预处理阶段 (Sc-2) 和商业上更成熟的超高温 (UHT) 炉 (Sc-3)。使用“开环”和“闭环”回收选项计算回收金属的净影响。结果表明，从 UHT 炉技术 (Sc-3) 转向 DC 等离子体技术可以将回收过程的 GWP 降低多达 5 倍（采用预处理时，如 Sc-2 的情况） . 结果也因因素而异，例如，不同的金属回收率、电网的碳/能源强度（在 Sc-1 和 Sc-2 中）、铝回收率（在 Sc-2 中）和焦炭来源（在Sc-3)。然而，敏感性分析表明，这些因素不会改变之前确定的最佳选择（如 Sc-2），除了 CED 的少数情况。总体而言，该生命周期评估提出的研究方法和应用为未来的能源和环境影响评估研究提供了信息，这些研究希望评估 LIB 或其他新兴技术的现有回收过程。JIE数据开放徽章在 http://jie.click/badges 中描述。