Methyl formate is a key component for both defossilized industry and mobility. The current industrial production via carbonylation of methanol has various disadvantages such as high requirements on reactant purity and low methanol conversion rates. In addition, there is a great interest in replacing the conventional homogeneous catalyst with a heterogeneous one, among other things to improve the downstream processing. This is why new approaches for methyl formate are sought. This review summarizes promising approaches for methyl formate production using methanol as a reactant.

The global market of lithium-ion batteries (LIB) has been growing in recent years, mainly owed to electromobility. The global LIB market is forecasted to amount to $129.3 billion in 2027. Considering the global reserves needed to produce these batteries and their limited lifetime, efficient recycling processes for secondary sources are mandatory. A selective process for Li recycling from LIB black mass is described. Depending on the process parameters Li was recovered almost quantitatively by the COOL-Process making use of the selective leaching properties of supercritical CO₂/water. Optimization of this direct carbonization process was carried out by a design of experiments (DOE) using a 3³ Box-Behnken design. Optimal reaction conditions were 230 °C, 4 h, and a water:black mass ratio of 90 mL/g, yielding 98.6 ± 0.19 wt.% Li. Almost quantitative yield (99.05 ± 0.64 wt.%), yet at the expense of higher energy consumption, was obtained with 230 °C, 4 h, and a water:black mass ratio of 120 mL/g. Mainly Li and Al were mobilized, which allows for selectively precipitating Li₂CO₃ in battery grade-quality (>99.8 wt.%) without the need for further refining. Valuable metals, such as Co, Cu, Fe, Ni, and Mn, remained in the solid residue (97.7 wt.%), from where they are recovered by established processes. Housing materials were separated mechanically, thus recycling LIB without residues. This holistic zero waste-approach allows for recovering the critical raw material Li from both primary and secondary sources.

Lithium is a key element in reducing mobility-induced emissions. However, processes aimed at producing lithium from hard rock mining are based on the usage of large amounts of chemicals. Additionally, only a small quantity of the mined mineral concentrates is actually valorized. In contrast, the COOL process (CO₂ Leaching process) is a process that makes use of water and carbon dioxide to leach lithium from any silicate mineral, making geopolymers from the residues. On the other hand, the COOL process enables the recovery of lithium from pretreated spent lithium-ion batteries.The leaching step has been investigated concerning the selective mobilization of lithium. Further attention was brought to the mobilization of potentially disturbing ions such as fluoride, aluminum, and silicon.It was found that the CO₂ leaching step is indeed suitable for the selective mobilization of lithium. Up to 65% of lithium mobilization was achieved without adding any additives and 78% by adding Na₂CO₃. Fluoride and silicon mobilization could be addressed by heating zinnwaldite under a wet atmosphere respectively under the addition of a carbonate. Concerning secondary resources, up to 95% of lithium could be leached from black mass, and the residue was then leached and the leach liquor separated by liquid-liquid extraction to yield the heavy metals in high recovery and selectivity.Overall, the COOL process enables the recovery of lithium from different feedstocks and valorizes the residues from the lithium leaching. This makes the COOL process a universal approach to lithium recovery. Graphical Abstract

BACKGROUND: The identification of new resources for producing biofuels and chemical‐based products is crucial for processes sustainability. This study presents a valorization route to produce ethanol and ethylene using cocoa's mucilage juice (MJ) residue from cocoa farms of variety ‘Arriba’ (AC). The processing parameters to maximize the ethanol production and subsequent selective conversion into ethylene were determined. Ethanol production has been carried out by investigating the effect of three parameters: the temperature of fermentation, the initial fermentation pH and the addition of (NH₄)₂SO₄ as an N source in the presence of free Saccharomyces cerevisiae NCYC 366. Consecutively, the selectivity of ethanol–ethylene conversion using a zeolite‐based ZSM‐5 catalyst was evaluated at different temperatures and ethanol concentrations.RESULTS: During ethanol production, the best sugar conversion was reached at 30 °C, adjusting the initial pH to 5 and without nitrogen source, resulting in 86.83% sugar conversion, the maximum ethanol concentration of 68.65 g L⁻¹ and maximum ethanol production rate of 2.03 g L⁻¹ h⁻¹ after 168 h of fermentation. On the other hand, ethylene was produced using ZSM‐5‐based zeolite catalyst with >99.9% of efficiency in the temperature range 240–300 °C. In addition, selective ethylene formation was found at 240 °C and 30 g L⁻¹ ethanol.CONCLUSION: The approach hereby presented shows the valorization of MJ waste of AC variety to produce ethanol and ethylene with minimum processing input costs, demonstrating a successful route to convert a farm residue into a bio‐based product with enhanced marketability. © 2022 The Authors. Journal of Chemical Technology and Biotechnology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of Society of Chemical Industry (SCI).