(from left) Dina Yulianita, Hilda Liliana Sihombing, and Rizka Amelia showed off the results of their ideas in the form of direct extraction of lithium from geothermal brine in Indonesia to reduce carbon emission

ITS Campus, ITS News – Students of Institut Teknologi Sepuluh Nopember (ITS) always working on an innovative new idea or developing existing ideas. This time, three students from Geophysical Engineering Department initiated the idea to produce lithium extraction directly from geothermal brine in Indonesia to reduce carbon emissions.

There are Dina Yulianita, Rizka Amelia, and Hilda Liliana Sihombing. They are all students of the class of 2017. They highlight issues related to the environment that are often a hot topic of discussion among the public, especially climate change due to carbon emissions.

According to Dina Yulianita, team leader, it is time to use clean and renewable energy to reduce climate change, One of Which uses lithium batteries. “Lithium reserves can be found in pegmatite rocks and brine water,” Dina said.

One of the power plant points in Indonesia that project to produce lithium extraction directly from geothermal brine

She explained that brine products are one of the results of geothermal that will inject back into the earth. As is well known, Indonesia’s potential for geothermal energy sources is very rich because it is located in the “Ring of Fire”. So it is not a big problem to produce lithium extraction.

“There are three proven optimal ways to extract lithium directly from geothermal brine, namely adsorption, ion exchange, and electroanalysis,” Dina said. Although there are three different ways, continued Dina, this direct extraction has the principle of separation of lithium ions from geothermal brine so that it can be used as raw material for lithium batteries.

Illustration of the process of separation of lithium ions with geothermal brine so that it can be used as raw material for lithium batteries

According to Dina, this extraction method has been done in several geothermal fields abroad, let’s say in the geothermal field Salton Sea, California, United States. However, Indonesia has only conducted a massive exploration to find nickel reserves that are also the raw material for making lithium batteries. “So we want this idea to be implemented in Indonesia so that it can later produce lithium batteries independently,” She said.

The idea of those delivered through the video managed to get the appreciation of the 3rd place in the Petroleum Euforia 2021 event organized by the Indonesian Petroleum Engineering Experts Association (IATMI) Balikpapan STT Migas Student Section online, not long ago. With all the limitations and in a short time, they conducted various research related to environmental and energy issues to give birth to a great idea that can be a solution for Indonesia.

“We hope from many parties can hear our aspirations and conduct further research so that our ideas can be realized,” he hoped. Furthermore, with the realization of this idea, Indonesia is expected to save costs to import lithium from abroad and contribute to reducing carbon emissions globally. (ITS PUBLIC RELATIONS)

Reporter: Faqih Ulumuddin