Abstract
Portable power sources and grid-scale storage both require batteries combining high energy density and low cost. Zinc metal battery systems are attractive due to the low cost of zinc and its high charge-storage capacity. However, under repeated plating and stripping, zinc metal anodes undergo a well-known problem, zinc dendrite formation, causing internal shorting. Here we show a backside-plating configuration that enables long-term cycling of zinc metal batteries without shorting. We demonstrate 800 stable cycles of nickel–zinc batteries with good power rate (20 mA cm−2, 20 C rate for our anodes). Such a backside-plating method can be applied to not only zinc metal systems but also other metal-based electrodes suffering from internal short circuits.
Highlights
Portable power sources and grid-scale storage both require batteries combining high energy density and low cost
To protect the edge of Cu substrate where current concentration takes place as indicated by our simulation, an amorphous insulating carbon layer was sputtered around the edge[18]
With the successful demonstration of backside Zn plating/ stripping without dendrite formation or large overpotential at reasonably high current density, here we demonstrate a Ni-Zn full-cell with high power and long-cycle life as an example of the application of the backside-plating configuration concept
Summary
Portable power sources and grid-scale storage both require batteries combining high energy density and low cost. We demonstrate 800 stable cycles of nickel–zinc batteries with good power rate (20 mA cm À 2, 20 C rate for our anodes) Such a backside-plating method can be applied to zinc metal systems and other metal-based electrodes suffering from internal short circuits. In our concept demonstrated here (Fig. 1b), the backside plating of Zn is realized by coating an insulating layer on the edges and the ‘front’ surface of Cu foil facing the Zn metal counter electrode. We note that the high ionic conductivity of 6 M aqueous KOH (0.6 S cm À 1)[17], a common electrolyte for conventional Zn-based batteries, can afford sufficient ion conduction for maintaining reasonable power rates. Our experiments and numerical analyses demonstrate how this configuration maintains performance
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