Battery Grade Lithium Hydroxide Introduction and Comparison

Lithium hydroxide is one of the three basic lithium salts in the lithium industry chain. Its main forms are anhydrous lithium hydroxide and lithium hydroxide monohydrate. Battery-grade lithium hydroxide monohydrate is mainly used in the preparation of cathode materials for lithium-ion batteries. It is also used as an additive in alkaline battery electrolytes and in the manufacture of lithium.

Lithium hydroxide, as the core lithium salt species downstream of the lithium industry chain, is an important raw material in the battery field, especially the high-nickel ternary cathode material widely used in high-performance batteries, and is an indispensable core lithium source in its production.

Lithium hydroxide production process

From the perspective of production technology, lithium hydroxide can be produced in one step after lithium sulfate is produced by acidification, or lithium can be extracted from salt lake brine to produce lithium carbonate, and then lithium hydroxide can be produced using a catalytic method. Therefore, considering the cost of producing lithium hydroxide from pyroxene, it is more advantageous.

Since the salt lake system has a clear cost advantage in lithium carbonate, while the ore system has a quality advantage and no cost disadvantage in lithium hydroxide, the new production capacity of lithium compounds in the ore system since 2019 has mainly focused on battery-grade lithium hydroxide on the production line.

However, the new production capacity of mica lithium extraction is mainly concentrated on the lithium carbonate production line, and its "quasi-grade" products are complementary to salt lake lithium extraction.

Extracting lithium from ore

The main disadvantage of extracting lithium from ore is that, except for a few high-grade resource sites (such as Taliesin-Greentree Lithium Mine), the use of ore to produce lithium carbonate and lithium chloride products is generally in the middle and high positions of the global cost curve.

From a cost-security perspective, extracting lithium from ore is more suitable for the production of high-quality products such as battery-grade lithium hydroxide.

Comparison of lithium carbonate and lithium hydroxide

Lithium carbonate and lithium hydroxide are both raw materials for batteries. In the market, the prices of lithium carbonate and lithium hydroxide have basically been rising and falling. What is the difference between these two materials?

Comparison with preparation process

Both can be extracted from spudomene, and there is not much difference in cost. However, if the two are converted into each other, additional costs and equipment are required, and the cost performance is not high. The technical routes are different. The preparation of lithium carbonate mainly uses the sulfuric acid method. Lithium sulfate is obtained through the reaction of sulfuric acid and spudiene. Sodium carbonate is added to the lithium sulfate solution, and then separated and dried to prepare lithium carbonate;

Lithium hydroxide is mainly prepared by the alkaline method, that is, using sodium fluoride and calcium hydroxide. Some people also use the so-called sodium carbonate pressurization method, that is, first prepare a lithium-containing solution, then add lime to the solution, and then prepare lithium hydroxide.

In short, spudene can be used to prepare lithium carbonate and lithium hydroxide at the same time, but the process routes are different, the equipment cannot be shared, and the cost difference is not significant. In addition, the cost of preparing lithium hydroxide from salt lake brine is much higher than that of lithium carbonate.