Issue 9, 2024

A corrosion-free zinc metal battery with an ultra-thin zinc anode and high depth of discharge

Abstract

Zinc metal batteries featuring high capacity, low cost, and environmental benignity have been receiving more attention than ever. Regrettably, due to the intrinsic thermodynamic instability of metallic zinc in conventional aqueous electrolytes, giant challenges still remain before its broad application. Herein, we report a corrosion-free zinc metal battery with an ultra-thin zinc anode and high depth of discharge by rational electrolyte engineering. This weakly coordinated aprotic electrolyte endows the metallic zinc with excellent thermodynamic stability in static storage by avoiding the generation of H+ and the zinc foil experienced no evident corrosion even after soaking for two weeks, which provides an important benchmark for employing an ultra-thin metallic zinc anode down to 10 μm-thick. Besides, benefiting from its distinctive weakly-coordinated solvation structure (i.e., [Zn(DMI)3]2+ and [Zn(DMI)4]2+), this electrolyte endows the zinc metal battery with superior electrochemical performance at a high depth of discharge. 10 μm Zn‖10 μm Zn symmetric cells stably cycled for 7220 hours at the current density of 1 mA cm−2 and 10 μm Zn‖15.3 mg cm−2 PANI full cells stably ran for 1700 cycles at the current density of 50 mA g−1, exhibiting a high capacity retention of 82.5%. Lastly, we revealed that the superior dynamic performance of the aqueous electrolyte is attributed to the faster mass transfer in the electrolyte rather than a lower de-solvation energy in the electrode/electrolyte interphase. This work illustrates a potential pathway for the commercial application of zinc metal batteries.

Graphical abstract: A corrosion-free zinc metal battery with an ultra-thin zinc anode and high depth of discharge

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
13 Dec 2023
Accepted
14 Mar 2024
First published
27 Mar 2024

Energy Environ. Sci., 2024,17, 3112-3122

A corrosion-free zinc metal battery with an ultra-thin zinc anode and high depth of discharge

R. Yao, Y. Zhao, L. Wang, C. Xiao, F. Kang, C. Zhi and C. Yang, Energy Environ. Sci., 2024, 17, 3112 DOI: 10.1039/D3EE04320G

To request permission to reproduce material from this article, please go to the Copyright Clearance Center request page.

If you are an author contributing to an RSC publication, you do not need to request permission provided correct acknowledgement is given.

If you are the author of this article, you do not need to request permission to reproduce figures and diagrams provided correct acknowledgement is given. If you want to reproduce the whole article in a third-party publication (excluding your thesis/dissertation for which permission is not required) please go to the Copyright Clearance Center request page.

Read more about how to correctly acknowledge RSC content.

Social activity

Spotlight

Advertisements