Electrolyte Concentration Regulation Boosting Zinc Storage Stability of High-Capacity K_0.486V₂O₅ Cathode for Bendable...

Vanadium-based cathodes have attracted great interest in aqueous zinc ion batteries (AZIBs) due to their large capacities, good rate performance and facile synthesis in large scale. However, their practical application is greatly hampered by vanadium dissolution issue in conventional dilute electrolytes. Herein, taking a new potassium vanadate K_0.486V₂O₅ (KVO) cathode with large interlayer spacing (~ 0.95 nm) and high capacity as an example, we propose that the cycle life of vanadates can be greatly upgraded in AZIBs by regulating the concentration of ZnCl₂ electrolyte, but with no need to approach "water-in-salt" threshold. With the optimized moderate concentration of 15 m ZnCl₂ electrolyte, the KVO exhibits the best cycling stability with ~ 95.02% capacity retention after 1400 cycles. We further design a novel sodium carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC)-moderate concentration ZnCl₂ gel electrolyte with high ionic conductivity of 10.08 mS cm^-1 for the first time and assemble a quasi-solid-state AZIB. This device is bendable with remarkable energy density (268.2 Wh kg^-1), excellent stability (97.35% after 2800 cycles), low self-discharge rate, and good environmental (temperature, pressure) suitability, and is capable of powering small electronics. The device also exhibits good electrochemical performance with high KVO mass loading (5 and 10 mg cm^-2). Our work sheds light on the feasibility of using moderately concentrated electrolyte to address the stability issue of aqueous soluble electrode materials.