Recycling Strategy and Recyclability Assessment Model Based on the Artificial Neural Network

Now, a rapidly growing concern for the environmental protection and resource utilization has stimulated many new activities in the in dustrialized world for coping with urgent environmental problems created by the steadily increasing consumption of industrial products. Increasingly stringent r egulations and widely expressed public concern for the environment highlight the importance of disposing solid waste generated from industrial and consumable pr oducts. How to efficiently recycle and tackle this problem has been a very impo rtant issue over the world. Designing products for recyclability is driven by environmental and economic goals. To obtain good recyclability, two measures can be adopted. One is better recycling strategy and technology; the other is design for recycling (DFR). The recycling strategies of products generally inclu de: reuse, service, remanufacturing, recycling of production scraps during the p roduct usage, recycle (separation first) and disposal. Recyclability assessment is a very important content in DFR. This paper first discusses the content of D FR and strategies and types related to products recyclability, and points out th at easy or difficult recyclability depends on the design phase. Then method and procedure of recyclability assessment based on ANN is explored in detail. The pr ocess consists of selection of the ANN input and output parameters, control of t he sample quality and construction and training of the neural network. At la st, the case study shows this method is simple and operative.

Progress in the sustainable recycling of spent lithium-ion batteries

Lithium-ion batteries(LIBs)are booming in multiple fields due to a rapid devel-opment in the last decade.However,limited by operational lifespans,a grow-ing number of spent LIBs reaching the end of their lives are consequently faced with serious accumulation and descended to hazardous waste.Without proper disposal,the spent LIBs will inevitably cause negative influence on the ecol-ogy and undermine the sustainable manufacture of LIBs.The initial research of recycling strategies mainly focused on the optimization of metallurgical pro-cesses.Recently,the sustainability of the recycling process has attracted much more attention and become an important factor.Here,we summarize the recent progress of the spent LIBs recycling from a sustainable perspective,especially discussing the green innovations in recycling strategies for spent LIBs.Through this article,we expect to reveal the challenges and developing tendency of the recycling strategies and provide a guideline for future researches on process-ing spent LIBs and beyond,like the recycling of the solid-state lithium metal batteries.