Use of Carbon Additives towards Rechargeable Zinc Slurry Air Flow Batteries

Nak Heon Choi; Diego del Olmo; Diego Milian; Nadia El Kissi; Peter Fischer; Karsten Pinkwart; Jens Tübke

LAPSE

Living Archive for Process Systems Engineering

LAPSE:2023.26109

Published Article

LAPSE:2023.26109

Use of Carbon Additives towards Rechargeable Zinc Slurry Air Flow Batteries

Nak Heon Choi, Diego del Olmo, Diego Milian, Nadia El Kissi, Peter Fischer, Karsten Pinkwart, Jens Tübke

March 31, 2023

The performance of redox flow batteries is notably influenced by the electrolyte, especially in slurry-based flow batteries, as it serves as both an ionic conductive electrolyte and a flowing electrode. In this study, carbon additives were introduced to achieve a rechargeable zinc slurry flow battery by minimizing the zinc plating on the bipolar plate that occurs during charging. When no carbon additive was present in the zinc slurry, the discharge current density was 24 mA∙cm−2 at 0.6 V, while the use of carbon additives increased it to up to 38 mA∙cm−2. The maximum power density was also increased from 16 mW∙cm−2 to 23 mW∙cm−2. Moreover, the amount of zinc plated on the bipolar plate during charging decreased with increasing carbon content in the slurry. Rheological investigation revealed that the elastic modulus and yield stress are directly proportional to the carbon content in the slurry, which is beneficial for redox flow battery applications, but comes at the expense of an increase in viscosity (two-fold increase at 100 s−1). These results show how the use of conductive additives can enhance the energy density of slurry-based flow batteries.

Record ID

LAPSE:2023.26109

Keywords

carbon additives, redox flow battery, rheology, zinc slurry air flow battery, zinc-air battery

Subject

Materials

Suggested Citation

Choi NH, del Olmo D, Milian D, El Kissi N, Fischer P, Pinkwart K, Tübke J. Use of Carbon Additives towards Rechargeable Zinc Slurry Air Flow Batteries. (2023). LAPSE:2023.26109

Author Affiliations

Choi NH: Applied Electrochemistry, Fraunhofer Institute for Chemical Technology ICT, Joseph-von-Fraunhofer, Straße 7, 76327 Pfinztal, Germany; Institute for Mechanical Process Engineering and Mechanics, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology KIT, Straße am Forum 8, 7
del Olmo D: Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Chemistry and Technology Prague, Technická 5, 16628 Prague 6, Czech Republic [ORCID]
Milian D: CNRS, Grenoble INP, LRP, Institute of Engineering, Univ. Grenoble Alpes, LRP, 38000 Grenoble, France
El Kissi N: CNRS, Grenoble INP, LRP, Institute of Engineering, Univ. Grenoble Alpes, LRP, 38000 Grenoble, France
Fischer P: Applied Electrochemistry, Fraunhofer Institute for Chemical Technology ICT, Joseph-von-Fraunhofer, Straße 7, 76327 Pfinztal, Germany
Pinkwart K: Applied Electrochemistry, Fraunhofer Institute for Chemical Technology ICT, Joseph-von-Fraunhofer, Straße 7, 76327 Pfinztal, Germany; Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology, Karlsruhe University of Applied Sciences, Moltkestraße 30 [ORCID]
Tübke J: Applied Electrochemistry, Fraunhofer Institute for Chemical Technology ICT, Joseph-von-Fraunhofer, Straße 7, 76327 Pfinztal, Germany; Institute for Mechanical Process Engineering and Mechanics, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology KIT, Straße am Forum 8, 7

Journal Name

Energies

Volume

13

Issue

17

Article Number

E4482

Year

2020

Publication Date

2020-08-31