Inkjet deposition can be a complementary technology to laser ablation to enable new processes. One such process is the One step interconnect for thin film photovoltaics, which is an improved method for series interconnection. The standard series interconnection process consists of three laser scribes between the deposition of the three key cell layers; transparent front contact, absorber layer and the metallic back contact. The one step interconnect allows the series interconnection to occur after the deposition of all layers significantly simplifying the manufacturing process. This is achieved by inkjet printing of conductive and insulative materials concurrently with depth selective laser scribes. The one step interconnect process has been shown to make effective interconnects on cadmium telluride photovoltaics with fill factors .60%. The benefits are many and include the reduction of capital equipment costs, reduced panel wastage and potentially improved material performance. The process is fully scalable and production ready.
As electric vehicles become more widely used, there is a higher demand for lithium‐ion batteries (LIBs) and hence a greater incentive to find better ways to recycle these at their end‐of‐life (EOL). This work focuses on the process of reclamation and re‐use of cathode material from LIBs. Black mass containing mixed LiMn
2
O
4
and Ni
0.8
Co
0.15
Al
0.05
O
2
from a Nissan Leaf pouch cell are recovered via two different recycling routes, shredding or disassembly. The waste material stream purity is compared for both processes, less aluminium and copper impurities are present in the disassembled waste stream. The reclaimed black mass is further treated to reclaim the transition metals in a salt solution, Ni, Mn, Co ratios are adjusted in order to synthesize an upcycled cathode, LiNi
0.6
Mn
0.2
Co
0.2
O
2
via a co‐precipitation method. The two reclamation processes (disassembly and shredding) are evaluated based on the purity of the reclaimed material, the performance of the remanufactured cell, and the energy required for the complete process. The electrochemical performance of recycled material is comparable to that of as‐manufactured cathode material, indicating no detrimental effect of purified recycled transition metal content. This research represents an important step toward scalable approaches to the recycling of EOL cathode material in LIBs.
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