Bridging the Fields of Solar Cell and Battery Research to Develop High-Performance Anodes for Photoelectrochemical Cells and Metal Ion Batteries

Sergei Manzhos and Giacomo Giorgi
Additional contact information
Sergei Manzhos: Department of Mechanical Engineering, National University of Singapore, Block EA #07-08, 9 Engineering Drive 1, Singapore 117576
Giacomo Giorgi: Research Center for Advanced Science and Technology, University of Tokyo, 4-6-1, Komaba, Meguro-ku, Tokyo 153-8904, Japan

Challenges, 2013, vol. 4, issue 1, 1-20

Abstract: Solar-to-electricity energy conversion and large scale electricity storage technologies are key to achieve a sustainable development of society. For energy conversion, photoelectrochemical solar cells were proposed as an economic alternative to the conventional Si-based technology. For energy storage, metal-ion batteries are a very promising technology. Titania (TiO 2 ) based anodes are widely used in photoelectrochemical cells and have recently emerged as safe, high-rate anodes for metal-ion batteries. In both applications, titania interacts with electrolyte species: molecules and metal ions. Details of this interaction determine the performance of the electrode in both technologies, but no unified theoretical description exists, e.g., there is no systematic description of the effects of Li, Na insertion into TiO 2 on solar cell performance (while it is widely studied in battery research) and no description of effects of surface adsorbents on the performance of battery anodes (while they are widely studied in solar cell research). In fact, there is no systematic description of interactions of electrolyte species with TiO 2 of different phases and morphologies. We propose a computation-focused study that will bridge the two fields that have heretofore largely been developing in parallel and will identify improved anode materials for both photoelectrochemical solar cells and metal-ion batteries.

Keywords: sustainable development; solar energy; electricity storage; photoelectrochemical cells; electrochemical batteries; titania; Na ion batteries; insertion; co-adsorbents (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: A00 C00 Z00 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2078-1547/4/1/116/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2078-1547/4/1/116/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jchals:v:4:y:2013:i:1:p:116-135:d:26597

Access Statistics for this article

Challenges is currently edited by Ms. Karen Sun

More articles in Challenges from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().