Effective Strategy to Achieve Excellent Energy Storage Properties in Lead-Free BaTiO₃-Based Bulk Ceramics

Although extensive studies have been done on lead-free dielectric ceramics to achieve excellent dielectric behaviors and good energy storage performance, the major problem of low energy density has not been solved so far. Here, we report on designing the crossover relaxor ferroelectrics (CRFE), a crossover region between the normal ferroelectrics and relaxor ferroelectrics, as a solution to overcome the low energy density. CRFE exhibits smaller free energy and lower defect density in the modified Landau theory, which helps to obtain ultrahigh energy density and efficiency. The (1-x)Ba_0.65Sr_0.35TiO₃-xBi(Mg_2/3Nb_1/3)O₃ ((1-x)BST-xBMN) (x = 0, 0.08, 0.1, 0.18, 0.2) ceramic was synthesized by a solid-state reaction method. The solid solutions exhibit dielectric frequency dispersion, which suggests typical relaxor characteristics with the increasing BMN content. The crossover ferroelectrics of 0.9BST-0.1BMN ceramic possesses a high energy storage efficiency (η) of 85.71%, a high energy storage density (W) of 3.90 J/cm³, and an ultrahigh recoverable energy storage density (W_rec) of 3.34 J/cm³ under a dielectric breakdown strength of 400 kV/cm and is superior to other lead-free BaTiO₃ (BT)-based energy storage ceramics. It also exhibits strong thermal stability in the temperature range from 25 to 150 °C under an electric field of 300 kV/cm, with the fluctuations below 3% and with the energy storage density and energy efficiency at about 2.8 J/cm³ and 82.93%, respectively. The enhanced recoverable energy density and breakdown strength of BT-based materials with significantly high energy efficiency make it a promising candidate to meet the wide requirements for high power applications.