Exploring sustainable lithium iron phosphate cathodes for Li-ion batteries: From mine to precursor and cathode production

Abstract

Lithium iron phosphate (LFP) cathodes are gaining popularity because of their safety features, long lifespan, and the availability of raw materials. Understanding the supply chain from mine to battery-grade precursors is critical for ensuring sustainable and scalable production. This review provides a comprehensive overview of the mining, beneficiation, processing, and purification processes of phosphorus, iron, and lithium ores. It explains the journey from mineral ores to purified iron (≥99 wt%) and phosphoric acid (≥85 wt%), detailing the strategies required to meet battery-grade specifications. This review covers different purification technologies and the key parameters that influence material grade and impurity levels. Processes capable of achieving impurity removal efficiencies of up to 99.9–100 % are highlighted. Although battery recycling has a high potential for recovering the material, existing extraction and refining processes for ores still need to be optimized to make processes both more efficient and more environmentally friendly. This review also discusses several production pathways for iron phosphate (FePO 4 ) and iron sulfate (FeSO 4 ) as key iron precursors. These insights are important for guiding future efforts toward the sustainable, efficient, and large-scale production of LFP cathodes to support the global energy transition. • Transformation of lithium, iron, and phosphorus ores into battery-grade precursors. • Key steps in purification and refining processes. • Overview of sustainable purified phosphoric acid production. • Methods to produce battery-grade Fe powder, Fe 2 O 3 /Fe 3 O 4 , FePO 4 , and FeSO 4 .