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A Stimulus-Responsive Zinc-Iodine Battery with Smart Overcharge Self-Protection Function.
Faxing Wang1, Jochi Tseng2, Zaichun Liu3
1Center for Advancing Electronics Dresden (cfaed) & Department of Chemistry and Food Chemistry, Technische Universität Dresden, Mommsenstrasse 4, Dresden, 01069, Germany.
Advanced Materials (Deerfield Beach, Fla.)
|March 6, 2020
Summary
Novel stimulus-responsive zinc-iodine aqueous batteries (SR-ZIABs) prevent overcharge damage using a smart pH-responsive electrolyte. These batteries self-protect by shutting down during overcharge and recover capacity when the pH is readjusted.
Area of Science:
- Electrochemistry
- Materials Science
- Energy Storage
Background:
- Zinc-iodine aqueous batteries (ZIABs) offer high capacity and safety for grid storage.
- Overcharging ZIABs causes side reactions and failure due to close redox potentials of zinc plating and hydrogen evolution.
Purpose of the Study:
- To develop a stimulus-responsive zinc-iodine aqueous battery (SR-ZIAB) with enhanced overcharge self-protection.
- To investigate the failure mechanism of ZIABs during overcharge and propose a solution.
Main Methods:
- Designed a smart pH-responsive electrolyte for SR-ZIABs.
- Utilized operando spectroelectrochemical characterizations to study battery behavior.
- Analyzed the impact of electrolyte pH changes on anode and cathode materials.
Main Results:
- SR-ZIABs exhibited rapid self-protection upon overcharge, reducing capacity to 6% and preventing continuous damage.
- Overcharge failure in ZIABs is linked to pH increase, ZnO formation at the anode, and Zn(IO3)2 at the cathode.
- SR-ZIABs demonstrated nearly 100% capacity recovery after pH readjustment.
Conclusions:
- The developed SR-ZIABs effectively mitigate overcharge-induced failure through a pH-responsive mechanism.
- This work provides a pathway for designing safer aqueous zinc batteries with self-protection capabilities.
- The smart electrolyte design offers a promising strategy for improving the reliability of grid-scale energy storage systems.
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