Lilac Solutions has been awarded a Phase I Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grant from the Department of Energy. This funding will enable Lilac to expand its portfolio of unique ion exchange materials for lithium extraction.

Under the SBIR award, Lilac will use cutting-edge techniques in materials design pioneered by founder Dave Snydacker. These computational “materials genome” techniques will allow Lilac to assess the performance of one thousand materials. Using traditional trial-and-error experiments, this assessment would take decades. Lilac will perform this work within one year using supercomputers at the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center. Mohammadreza Karamad, formerly a post-doc at Stanford University, will join the Lilac team as a Materials Design Engineer.

Lithium Extraction
Lithium is an essential element for the advanced batteries in portable electronics and electric vehicles. Most of the world’s lithium reserves are found in salt brines, with current production concentrated in South America. The conventional process for extracting lithium from brines requires large evaporation ponds, large quantities of chemical inputs, and long development times. This process suffers from low lithium recovery and cannot access marginal lithium resources. Lithium producers are seeking new extraction methods to access resources around the world.

Ion exchange is an alternative process for lithium extraction. This process is modular and can be ramped in time with the market. Lilac’s unique ion exchange materials will enable lithium producers to streamline operations, boost lithium recovery, and access new brine resources. These new sources of lithium are needed to meet growing demand for electric vehicles.