Lithium and Scattered Metals from Liquid Ores: A Roadmap for Future Extraction Technologies

doi:10.1007/s40242-025-5204-8

Abstract

Abstract: Driven by the dual-carbon strategy and the artificial intelligence revolution, rare scattered metals, such as lithium, rubidium, and cesium have become critical strategic resources supporting new energy and high-tech industries. However, China’s high external dependency on these resources poses risks to supply security and geopolitical stability. Liquid mineral resources, such as salt lake brines, characterized by vast reserves, low extraction costs, and environmental friendliness, represent a crucial direction for future resource security. This review systematically summarizes mainstream and emerging technologies for extracting lithium and rare scattered metals from brines, including precipitation, solvent extraction, adsorption, membrane separation, and electrochemical methods. It focuses on analyzing the principles, application status, and research progress of related materials for each method. Among them, adsorption, membrane separation and electrochemical methods are widely studied due to their green and efficient characteristics. By comparing their advantages and limitations in terms of selectivity, energy consumption, environmental impact, and industrialization potential, the study outlines future trends in green, efficient, and low-energy consumption extraction technologies, providing technical support for China’s autonomous supply of strategic metal resources.

Key words: Lithium extraction from brines, Strategic metal, Rare scattered metal, Adsorption method, Membrane separation, Electrochemical method

MA Xinyi, FU Yuan, LIU Jia. Lithium and Scattered Metals from Liquid Ores: A Roadmap for Future Extraction Technologies[J]. Chemical Research in Chinese Universities, 2025, 41(6): 1294-1313.

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