A Na + ion conducting polyethylene oxide membrane is developed for an organic electrolyte redox flow battery that utilizes anion radical mediators. To achieve high specific ionic conductivity, tetraethyleneglycol dimethylether (TEGDME) is used as a plasticizer to reduce crystallinity and increase the free volume of the gel film. This membrane is physically and chemically stable in TEGDME electrolyte that contains highly reactive biphenyl anion radical mediators.
Nitrogen gas N 2 can be reduced to nitride N -3 in molten LiCl-KCl eutectic salt electrolyte. However, the direct oxidation of N -3 back to N 2 is kinetically slow and only occurs at high overvoltage. The overvoltage for N -3 oxidation can be eliminated by coordinating the N -3 with BN to form the dinitridoborate (BN 2 -3 ) anion which forms a 1-D conjugated linear inorganic polymer with -Li-N-B-N- repeating units. This polymer precipitates out of solution as Li 3 BN 2 which becomes a metallic conductor upon delithiation. Li 3 BN 2 is oxidized to Li + + N 2 + BN at about the N 2 /N -3 redox potential with very little overvoltage. In this report we evaluate the N 2 /N -3 redox couple as a battery anode for energy storage.
This paper describes an assessment of a variety of battery technologies for high pulse power applications. Sandia National Laboratories (SNL) is performing the assessment activities in collaboration with NSWC-Dahlgren. After an initial study of specifications and manufacturers' data, the assessment team identified the following electrochemistries as promising for detailed evaluation: lead-acid (Pb-acid), nickel/metal hydride (Ni/MH), nickel/cadmium (Ni/Cd), and a recently released high power lithium-ion (Li-ion) technology. In the first three technology cases, test cells were obtained from at least two and in some instances several companies that specialize in the respective electrochemistry. In the case of the Li-ion technology, cells from a single company and are being tested. All cells were characterized in Sandia's battery test labs. After several characterization tests, the Pb-acid technology was identified as a backup technology for the demanding power levels of these tests. The other technologies showed varying degrees of promise. Following additional cell testing, the assessment team determined that the Ni/MH technology was suitable for scale-up and acquired 50-V Ni/MH modules from two suppliers for testing. Additional tests are underway to better characterize the Ni/Cd and the Li-ion technologies as well. This paper will present the testing methodology and results from these assessment activities.