Analysis of Trace Elements as Impurities in Materials Used for Lithium-Ion Battery Production

The continuous development of lithium-ion battery technology is a key step in moving away from the combustion of fossil fuels at point of use. Lithium-based batteries are the most promising alternative because they combine high capacity and good cycle stability while being moderately inexpensive. To achieve the intended performance and test for purity of the raw materials used, including cathode materials (like binary or ternary alloys containing lithium, cobalt, manganese and nickel) and electrolytes (lithium hexafluorophosphate) is highly important. For analyzing trace elements at the required levels, techniques based on inductively coupled plasmas (ICP) are the ideal choice, especially ICP–optical emission spectroscopy (ICP-OES) and also increasingly ICP–mass spectrometry (ICP-MS).