PATENT CLAIM ANALYSIS

Application Number: 15754113
Application Type: Utility
Filing Date: 2018-02
Publication Date: 2018-08
Patent Classification: ["210", "638000"]

Abstract:
Producing high purity lithium solution from a lithium source containing dissolved Na + , Ca 2+ , and Mg 2+ , by: passing the source into and out of a bed of sorbent composed of hydrated alumina intercalated with LiX, preferably LiCl, to extract lithium from the lithium source into the sorbent; washing the bed of sorbent with dilute aqueous LiCl to remove lithium from the sorbent to obtain a lithium eluent of increased Li +  concentration; subjecting this eluent to nanofiltration to produce a lithium permeate from which Ca2+, Mg2+, and other nanofilterable components are concurrently removed, yielding a permeate solution with 25% or less, and a retentate solution with 75% or more Ca 2+  and Mg 2+ , as compared to the eluent from washing; and subjecting the permeate solution to a particular forward osmosis yielding a solution having 13,000-25,000 ppm dissolved lithium. Specified optional steps and new features can be used to increase lithium concentrations and purity.

Claim (Index 1):
A process for producing a high purity aqueous lithium-containing solution from a source of dissolved lithium that also contains at least Na + , Ca 2+ , and Mg 2+  in solution, which process comprises:\n (A) passing said source of dissolved lithium into and out of a bed of sorbent comprised of hydrated alumina intercalated with LiX, where X is an anion of a lithium salt, to thereby extract at least a portion of lithium from the source of dissolved lithium into the sorbent; \n (B) washing the bed of sorbent in which sorption of lithium cations has occurred with a dilute solution of lithium chloride to unload the lithium cations from the sorbent to obtain a lithium eluent solution of increased Li +  concentration; \n (C) subjecting the lithium eluent solution to nanofiltration to produce a lithium-containing permeate from which Ca 2+  and Mg 2+  components and other nanofilterable metal components are removed concurrently and conducting the nanofiltration causing a separation in which a retentate solution is formed with a total amount of Ca 2+  and Mg 2+  of at least 75% as compared to the total amount Ca 2+  and Mg 2+  in said source of dissolved lithium and forming an aqueous lithium-containing permeate solution in which the total content of dissolved Ca 2+  and Mg 2+  has been decreased such that the total content thereof is 25% or less as compared to said lithium eluent solution; and \n (D) subjecting said permeate solution to forward osmosis through a plurality of successive or parallel semi-permeable forward osmosis membranes in units that further reduce the water content of said permeate solution and thereby further increase the lithium concentration of the permeate solution so that it is in the range of about 13,000 to about 25,000 ppm of dissolved lithium.

Metadata:
- Claim Count in Document: 38.0
- Percentile: 88.0
- Lexical Diversity: 2.0
- Patent Class: 210.0
- Transitional Phrase Type: open
- Component Type: 1
- Foreign Priority: False
- Related Applications: ['13283311', '14529324', '13029908', '15702277', '13002591']

Analysis Scores:
- 35 USC 101 Eligibility (BERT): 0.7902286321997943
- 35 USC 102 Novelty (BERT): 0.4761292034640357
- Combined Prediction Score: 0.7588186893262185
- Mean Citation Score: 219.592154
- Max Citation Score: 226.88597
- Similarity Product: 188.3998458768064

Labels:
- Claim Label 101: 1
- Claim Label 102: 1
- Claim Label 103: 0
- Claim Label 112: 0
- Combined Label: 1
- Label 101 Adjusted: 1

Dataset: test