Novel lignocellulose based gel polymer electrolyte with higher comprehensive performances for rechargeable lithium–sulfur battery

Abstract

For the first time the most abundant natural biomass lignocellulose (LC) on earth is exploited as the matrix of gel polymer electrolyte (GPE) in lithium-sulfur (Li-S) batteries. The prepared GPE based on LC fiber length range (150–300 µm) presents extremely excellent comprehensive performances: high enough liquid electrolyte uptake of 428 wt%, satisfying tensile strength of 3.89 MPa, outstanding ionic conductivity of 4.52 mS cm−1 at room temperature, excellent lithium ion transference number of 0.79, electrochemical stability window of 5.3 V, good compatibility with lithium electrode and thermal stability. The assembled lithium sulfur cell using obtained GPE of G2 shows excellent rate and cycling performance compared to corresponding cell with commercial liquid electrolyte with separator, which is attributed to the successfully suppressed “shuttle effect” in the cell with GPE. What is more important, the LC based GPE is prepared with simple process and biodegradable, which endow the corresponding Li-S batteries with application possibility.