Low-cost battery from waste graphite

said braka 9:52 PM
Kostiantyn Kravchyk works in the group of Maksym

Kovalenko. This research group is based at both ETH Zurich and in Empa's Laboratory for Thin Films and Photovoltaics. The two researchers' ambitious goal at the Empa branch is to make a  out of the most common elements in the Earth's crust – such as magnesium or aluminum. These metals offer a high degree of safety, even if the anode is made of pure metal. This also offers the opportunity to assemble the batteries in a very simple and inexpensive way and to rapidly upscale the production.
In order to make such batteries run, the liquid electrolyte needs to consist of special ions that do not crystallize at room temperature – i.e. form a kind of melt. The metal ions move back and forth between the cathode and the anode in this "cold melt", encased in a thick mantle of chloride ions. Alternatively, large but lightweight organic anions, which are metal-free, could be used. This does come with a problem, though: where are these "thick" ions supposed to go when the battery is charged? What could be a suited ? By way of comparison: in lithium ion batteries, the cathode is made of a metal oxide, which can easily absorb the small lithium cations during charging. This does not work for such large ions, however. In addition, these large anions have an opposite charge to the lithium cations.


Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2017-10-low-cost-battery-graphite.html#jCp