Hydrides as high capacity anodes for Li-ion batteries
Lithium ion batteries are currently used as power sources for wireless telephones, laptops and other portable electronic devices: this mobile market is rapidly expanding due to the worldwide demand.
Great research efforts are constantly under way all around the world to further improve the technology and to face the transition to new challenging application fields (automotive, energy storage from intermittent “green” sources), which requires higher energy and power.
However the planned mass commercialization of hybrid or electric vehicles requires to venture well beyond the present state of the art by increasing the battery performances and, even more important, by achieving higher safety standards.
The ambition of this project is to pursue an effective and unique knowledge-driven breakthrough in Li-ion technologies by developing the revolutionary concept of a lithium-ion/metal-hydride battery, thus changing the usual concept of a rechargeable Li-ion electrochemical cell. This innovation has the potential to overcome both safety and performance limitations of the current state-of-the-art Li-ion technologies. Indeed the exploitation in negative electrodes of metal hydride conversion reactions to give LiH, instead standard intercalation or alloying processes, can potentially unlock outstanding improvements both in the energy levels and in the battery safety.
The final grand target of this project is to develop a prototype of a complete Li-ion cell with an hydride-conversion reaction (HCR) anode, a cathode material and a liquid electrolyte, able to give prolonged galvanostatic cycling with improved performances compared to graphite. The achievement of this target can potentially open the door to a technology capable to support a massive commercialization of “green cars”.
Partners and collaborators
Dipartimento di Chimica, Sapienza Università di Roma - Dr. Priscilla Reale (Project coordinator), Dr. David Munaò, Prof. Stefania Panero
Istituto dei Sistemi Complessi - Dr. Sergio Brutti (Unit coordinator), Dr. Annalisa Paolone, Dr. Oriele Palumbo, Daniele Meggiolaro