As industries accelerate efforts to decarbonize, nickel’s role in batteries and stainless steel has become increasingly vital. However, conventional nickel production is highly carbon-intensive, emitting about 20 tons of CO₂ for every ton of nickel produced. With global demand for nickel expected to double by 2040, largely due to electrification in transport and infrastructure, the environmental impact of traditional extraction methods has raised significant concerns.
Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Sustainable Materials have developed a new, carbon-free method for extracting nickel that could transform the industry. Their approach uses hydrogen plasma instead of carbon-based processes, enabling the extraction of nickel from low-grade ores in a single step. This innovation bypasses the traditional multi-stage processes—calcination, smelting, reduction, and refining—by combining them in one electric arc furnace. The result is a refined ferronickel alloy with minimal impurities, suitable for direct use in stainless steel or, with further refinement, in battery electrodes. The process achieves up to 84% reduction in CO₂ emissions and is up to 18% more energy efficient when powered by renewable electricity and green hydrogen.
Unlike conventional methods that require high-grade ores, this technique can process low-grade nickel ores, which make up about 60% of global reserves. The hydrogen plasma method breaks down complex mineral structures into simpler ionic species, even without catalysts, and produces high-grade ferronickel alloys at rapid reduction rates. This breakthrough allows smelting, reduction, and refining to occur simultaneously in a single reactor, drastically simplifying the process and broadening the spectrum of usable nickel sources.
Scaling the process for industrial use is the next step. Researchers are exploring established techniques such as short electric arcs with high currents, electromagnetic stirring beneath the furnace, and gas injection to ensure that unreduced melt continuously reaches the reaction interface. These methods are already familiar in industrial metallurgy, making integration into existing production lines feasible. The new process not only reduces emissions and energy use but also lowers costs by enabling efficient use of previously overlooked low-grade ores.
This hydrogen plasma process opens the door to more sustainable electrification of the transport sector and other industries dependent on nickel. The slag generated during reduction can also be repurposed for construction materials, further enhancing the sustainability of the approach. The same principles may also be applied to extract other critical metals, such as cobalt, for use in batteries and energy storage systems.
