Printed air cathode for flexible and high energy density zinc-air battery

Abstract

Flexible zinc-air batteries were fabricated using an inexpensive screen-printing technique. The anode and cathode current collectors were printed using commercial nano-silver conductive ink on a polyethylene terephthalate (PET) substrate and a polypropylene (PP) membrane, respectively. Air cathodes made of blended carbon black with inexpensive metal oxides including manganese oxide (MnO2) and cerium oxide (CeO2), were studied. The presence of the metal oxides in the air cathodes enhanced the oxygen reduction reaction which is the most important cathodic reaction in zinc-air batteries. The battery with 20 %wt CeO2 showed the highest performance and provided an open-circuit voltage of 1.6 V and 5 – 240 mA.cm-2 ohmic loss zone. The discharge potential of this battery at the current density of 5 mA.cm-2 was nearly 0.25 V higher than that of the battery without metal oxides. Finally, the battery was tested for its flexibility by bending it so that its length decreased from 2.5 to 1 cm. The results showed that the bending did not affect characteristics on potential voltage and discharging time of the batteries fabricated.