Systematic Investigation of the Physical and Electrochemical Characteristics of the Vanadium (III) Acidic Electrolyte...

Owing to the lack of systematic kinetic theory about the redox reaction of V(III)/V(II), the poor electrochemical performance of the negative process in vanadium flow batteries limits the overall battery performance to a great extent. As the key factors that influence electrode/electrolyte interfacial reactivity, the physicochemical properties of the V(III) acidic electrolyte play an important role in the redox reaction of V(III)/V(II), hence a systematic investigation of the physical and electrochemical characteristics of V(III) acidic electrolytes with different concentrations and related diffusion kinetics was conducted in this work. It was found that the surface tension and viscosity of the electrolyte increase with increasing V(III) concentration, while the corresponding conductivity shows an opposite trend. Both the surface tension and viscosity change slightly with increasing concentration of H₂SO₄, but the conductivity increases significantly, indicating that a lower V(III) concentration and a higher H₂SO₄ concentration are conducive to the ion transfer process. The electrochemical measurements further show that a higher V(III) concentration will facilitate the redox reaction of V(III)/V(II), while the increase in H₂SO₄ concentration only improves the ion transmission and has little effect on the electron transfer process. Furthermore, the diffusion kinetics of V(III) have been further studied with cyclic voltammetry and chronopotentiometry. The results show that an elevated temperature facilitates the V(III)/V(II) redox reaction and gives rise to an increased electrode reaction rate constant (k _s) and diffusion coefficient [D _V(III)]. On this basis, the diffusion activation energy (13.7 kJ·mol^-1) and the diffusion equation of V(III) are provided to integrate kinetic theory in the redox reaction of V(III)/V(II).