Metal electrodes have a high capacity for energy storage but have found limited applications in batteries because of dendrite formation and other problems. In this paper, we report a new alloying strategy that can significantly reduce the melting temperature and improve wetting with the electrolyte to allow the use of liquid metal as anode in sodium-beta alumina batteries (NBBs) at much lower temperatures (e.g., 95 to 175°C). Commercial NBBs such as sodium-sulfur (Na-S) battery and sodium-metal halide (ZEBRA) batteries typically operate at relatively high temperatures (e.g., 300-350°C) due to poor wettability of sodium on the surface of ß"-Al2O3. Our combined experimental and computational studies suggest that Na-Cs alloy can replace pure sodium as the anode material, which provides a significant improvement in wettability, particularly at lower temperatures (i.e.,
Revised: July 13, 2015 |
Published: August 1, 2014
Citation
Lu X., G. Li, J.Y. Kim, D. Mei, J.P. Lemmon, V.L. Sprenkle, and J. Liu. 2014.Liquid-Metal Electrode to Enable Ultra-Low Temperature Sodium-Beta Alumina Batteries for Renewable Energy Storage.Nature Communications 5.PNNL-SA-99549.doi:10.1038/ncomms5578