All-temperature zinc batteries with high-entropy aqueous electrolyte

Chongyin Yang, Jiale Xia, Chunyu Cui, Travis P. Pollard, Jenel Vatamanu, Antonio Faraone, Joseph A. Dura, Madhusudan Tyagi, Alex Kattan, Elijah Thimsen, Jijian Xu, Wentao Song, Enyuan Hu, Xiao Ji, Singyuk Hou, Xiyue Zhang, Michael S. Ding, Sooyeon Hwang, Dong Su, Yang Ren, Xiao-Qing Yang, Howard Wang, Oleg Borodin () and Chunsheng Wang ()
Additional contact information
Chongyin Yang: University of Maryland
Jiale Xia: University of Maryland
Chunyu Cui: University of Maryland
Travis P. Pollard: DEVCOM Army Research Laboratory
Jenel Vatamanu: DEVCOM Army Research Laboratory
Antonio Faraone: NIST Center for Neutron Research, National Institute of Standards and Technology
Joseph A. Dura: NIST Center for Neutron Research, National Institute of Standards and Technology
Madhusudan Tyagi: NIST Center for Neutron Research, National Institute of Standards and Technology
Alex Kattan: Washington University
Elijah Thimsen: Washington University
Jijian Xu: University of Maryland
Wentao Song: Dalhousie University
Enyuan Hu: Brookhaven National Laboratory
Xiao Ji: University of Maryland
Singyuk Hou: University of Maryland
Xiyue Zhang: University of Maryland
Michael S. Ding: DEVCOM Army Research Laboratory
Sooyeon Hwang: Brookhaven National Laboratory
Dong Su: Brookhaven National Laboratory
Yang Ren: Argonne National Laboratory
Xiao-Qing Yang: Brookhaven National Laboratory
Howard Wang: University of Maryland
Oleg Borodin: DEVCOM Army Research Laboratory
Chunsheng Wang: University of Maryland

Nature Sustainability, 2023, vol. 6, issue 3, 325-335

Abstract: Abstract Electrification of transportation and rising demand for grid energy storage continue to build momentum around batteries across the globe. However, the supply chain of Li-ion batteries is exposed to the increasing challenges of resourcing essential and scarce materials. Therefore, incentives to develop more sustainable battery chemistries are growing. Here we show an aqueous ZnCl2 electrolyte with introduced LiCl as supporting salt. Once the electrolyte is optimized to Li2ZnCl4⋅9H2O, the assembled Zn–air battery can sustain stable cycling over the course of 800 hours at a current density of 0.4 mA cm−2 between −60 °C and +80 °C, with 100% Coulombic efficiency for Zn stripping/plating. Even at −60 °C, >80% of room-temperature power density can be retained. Advanced characterization and theoretical calculations reveal a high-entropy solvation structure that is responsible for the excellent performance. The strong acidity allows ZnCl2 to accept donated Cl− ions to form ZnCl42− anions, while water molecules remain within the free solvent network at low salt concentration or coordinate with Li ions. Our work suggests an effective strategy for the rational design of electrolytes that could enable next-generation Zn batteries.

Date: 2023
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-022-01028-x Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

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:nat:natsus:v:6:y:2023:i:3:d:10.1038_s41893-022-01028-x

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/natsustain/

DOI: 10.1038/s41893-022-01028-x

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Sustainability is currently edited by Monica Contestabile

More articles in Nature Sustainability from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().