Methods and systems for the production of crystalline flake graphite from biomass or other carbonaceous materials

Abstract

High quality flake graphite is produced by methods that include mixing a carbon-containing feedstock with a catalyst to form a feedstock/catalyst mixture, or coating a catalyst with a carbon-containing feedstock, and subjecting the mixture or feedstock-coated catalyst to irradiation with a laser to convert the feedstock into flake graphite in the presence of the catalyst. In some instances, the feedstock is converted to a char by pyrolysis and the char is instead subjected to laser irradiation. The feedstock can be a biomass or a carbonaceous material. The catalyst can be an elemental metal, an alloy, or a combination thereof. In some instances, methods described herein have been found to produce high quality flake graphite in the form of potato shaped agglomerates.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.