Is the aluminum ion battery a hope or a gimmick?

Yesterday, the news from a professor at Hunan University who developed an aluminum-ion battery appeared in major media.

In the report, the professor of Hunan University published a paper in a famous scientific journal, and developed an aluminum-ion battery with fast charging and long cycle life, which will change the world. Interestingly, on the same day, other news said that Stanford University has also developed an aluminum-ion battery, which is also fast charging and long cycle life. What is going on? Who did it? Is this thing reliable? Can it really change our world?

Is aluminum ion battery a gimmick or hope?

Who did it?

The news on the Chinese side is: top international academic journals published online in nature, the university associate professor, institute of physics and microelectronics science Bing’an Lu and others as "author" papers "fast charging and discharging of aluminium ion battery". "Nature" magazine believes that the research results, for the first time, the realization of rechargeable aluminum ion liquid batteries, which is expected to bring revolutionary changes to the international battery industry.

Bing'an Lu said that in the past, a mobile phone using a lithium battery took one hour to complete, and the aluminum battery took only one minute to complete. In the future, when the aluminum battery is charged for 1 hour, the use of the mobile phone for 3 or 4 days will no longer be a hypothesis.

And Stanford information is Chinese professor HongjieDai and his colleagues at the innovative aluminium ion battery research is published in the April 6 of the journal nature.

Aluminium ion battery consists of two electrodes: "a negatively charged by aluminum anode and a positively charged graphite cathode, people tried different materials used as cathode," and the Stanford team surprises simple solution to the problem is the use of graphite, graphite is essentially carbon. Some types of graphite materials can produce very good feature."Stanford team experimental battery installed aluminum anode and graphite cathode, electrolyte is actually the liquid salt at room temperature, so it is very safe. Our aluminum rechargeable battery can produce 2 volts. This than any voltage aluminum battery can produce high."But we can only achieve a typical battery Lithium electricity pool half of voltage, if improve cathode materials should be able to eventually increase the voltage and energy density. So, we create the battery will satisfy all your vision battery characteristics: inexpensive electrode, safe, fast charging, flexible, and a long life. I have seen this kind of original new batteries, it's really exciting."The inventor professor Dai said.

Other researchers in the study include Meng-ChangLin, a visiting scientist from the Taiwan Industrial Technology Research Institute, Bingan Lu, and Hou PengengWu, a postdoctoral fellow at Hunan University. Other authors include Di-Yan Wang, MingyunGuan, Michael Angel, Changxin Chen, and JiangYang at Stanford University; and Bing-Joe Hwang from Taiwan National Normal University. . The study was supported by the US Department of Energy, the Taiwan Industrial Technology Research Institute, the Stanford University Global Climate and Energy Program, the Stanford Precott Energy Research Institute, and the Taiwan Ministry of Education.

Comparing the two reports, we can see that this project is actually a comprehensive research project provided by the US Department of Energy and other institutions. Professor Lu of Hunan University is only one of the research scholars. This is still a US research project, not Hunan University, the domestic communication is suspected of attracting attention with the title.

Where is the breakthrough in aluminum-ion battery technology?

In fact, aluminum batteries have long been considered to have a certain development prospects for research because of the potential for energy density. But so far, aluminum batteries have only been used as metal fuel cells, not charging, but replacing aluminum electrodes to replenish electricity. What run hundreds of kilometers in the former period of aluminum battery cars refer to this.

Aluminum battery rechargeable batteries don't have to do, on the one hand, is a poor cycle life, on the one hand, being too slow, not practical. There is a fatal defect is the inside of the aluminum electrolyte ions is not stable, easy to react at risk. These weaknesses make aluminum battery has not been practical.

And information from paper, Stanford this project developed a special kind of graphite anode materials, can quick charge. Didn't say clear graphene in the news, but over the years there have been many made negative graphene materials, improve lithium battery charging speed of the news, a Spanish university has done even the point of loading test.

However, most of the graphene anodes have a very short cycle life, and 7500 times attenuation is a miracle. If the data is true, there is a breakthrough in the material. In addition, Stanford has found a suitable electrolyte to ensure battery safety. If Dr. Dai does not lie, this battery is safer than a lithium-ion battery, which is hard to come by. Therefore, this aluminum-ion battery actually advances in materials, and the new negative electrode and new electrolyte produce an ideal aluminum-ion battery.

How far is it from the practical?

We have noticed that the inventor also said that the battery is a prototype, rather than the finished product, problems are still a lot. Aluminum battery was theoretical capacity is very high, but the inventor said to further increase the energy density, suggesting that at least experiment energy density is insufficient, and aluminum battery power density was also have a poor sense of direction, the voltage is not high also, this limits the scope of its use. Although the number of cycles is gratifying, the charging speed is gratifying, but the power is poor and the power is poor. It can't be used in many places. For example, a mobile phone with a high battery size.

However, in electric vehicles, especially electric buses, such long-life and fast-charging batteries are still promising. In addition to technical issues, it takes a long process from laboratory to mass production, how to build a production line, how to control quality, and how to maintain consistency in new materials.

As the inventor said, there is only a good prototype now, and it is possible to develop an ideal battery. Aluminum is much cheaper than lithium, and graphite is not expensive. As long as the aluminum ion battery is used to match the lithium-ion battery in terms of energy density and power density, the lithium-ion battery can be completely replaced by the advantages and costs of other technical indicators. Then our world is really changed.

At present, aluminum-ion batteries are only gimmicks, and in the future it will be the hope of human new energy.

The page contains the contents of the machine translation.