Progress and prospects of pH-neutral aqueous organic redox flow batteries:Electrolytes and membranes

Aqueous organic redox flow batteries(AORFBs),which exploit the reversible electrochemical reactions of water-soluble organic electrolytes to store electricity,have emerged as an efficient electrochemical energy storage technology for the grid-scale integration of renewable electricity.pH-neutral AORFBs that feature high safety,low corrosivity,and environmental benignity are particularly promising,and their battery performance is significantly impacted by redox-active molecules and ion-exchange membranes(IEMs).Here,representative anolytes and catholytes engineered for use in pH-neutral AORFBs are outlined and summarized,as well as their side reactions that cause irreversible battery capacity fading.In addition,the recent achievements of IEMs for pH-neutral AORFBs are discussed,with a focus on the construction and tuning of ion transport channels.Finally,the critical challenges and potential research opportunities for developing practically relevant pH-neutral AORFBs are presented.

Steric hindrance shielding viologen against alkali attack in realizing ultrastable aqueous flow batteries

Viologens known as a kind of promising negolyte materials for aqueous organic redox flow batteries,face a critical stability challenge due to the S_N2 nucleophilic attack by hydroxide ions(OH-)during the battery cycling.In this work,a N-cyclic quaternary ammonium-grafted viologen molecule,viz.1,1'-bis(4,4'-dime thylpiperidiniumyl)-4,4'-bipyridinium tetrachloride((DBPPy)Cl_(4)),is developed by the molecular engineering strategy.The obtained(DBPPy)Cl_(4) molecule shows a decent solubility of 1.84 M and a redox potential of-0.52 V vs.Ag/AgCl,Experimental and theoretical results reveal that the grafted N-cyclic quaternary ammonium groups act as the steric hindrance to prevent nucleophilic attack by OH~-,increasing the alkali resistance of the electroactive molecule.The symmetrical battery with 0.50 M(DBPPy)Cl4shows negligible decay during the 13-day cycling test.As demonstration,the flow battery utilizing 1.0 M(DBPPy)Cl_(4) as the negolyte and 1-(1-oxyl-2,2',6,6'-tetramethylpiperidin-4-yl)-1'-(3-(trimethylammonio)propyl)-4,4'-bipyridinium trichloride as the posolyte exhibits a high capacity retention rate of 99.99%per cycle at 60 mA cm^(-2).

Spatial structure regulation towards armor-clad five-membered pyrroline nitroxides catholyte for long-life aqueous organic redox flow batteries

Five-membered pyrroline nitroxides with high-potential is fascinating as catholyte for aqueous organic redox flow batteries(AORFBs),however,it suffers from a primary deficiency of insufficient stability due to ring-opening side reaction.Herein we report a spatial structure regulation strategy by host-guest chemistry,encapsulating 3-carbamoyl-2,2,5,5-tetramethylpyrroline-1-oxyl(CPL)into hydrosoluble cyclodextrins(CDs)with an inclusion structure of N–O⋅head towards cavity bottom,to boost the solubility and cyclability of pyrroline nitroxides significantly.The armor-clad CPL(CPL⊂HP-β-CD)catholyte in 0.05–0.5 M presents a battery capacity fade rate as low as 0.002%/cycle(0.233%/day)compared to the sole CPL in 0.05 M(0.039%/cycle or 5.23%/day)over 500 cycles in assembled AORFBs.The optimized reclining spatial structure with N–O⋅head towards CD cavity bottom effectively inhibits the attack of Lewis base species on the hydrogen abstraction site in pyrroline ring,and thus avoids the ring-opening side reaction of pyrroline nitroxides.

Arylene Diimide Derivatives as Anolyte Materials with Two-Electron Storage for Ultrastable Neutral Aqueous Organic Redox Flow Batteries

Two-electron neutral aqueous organic redox flow batteries(AORFBs)hold more promising applications in the power grid than one-electron batteries because of their higher capacity.However,their development is strongly limited by the structural instability of the highly reduced species.By combining the extendedπ-conjugation structure of the anolytes and the enhanced aromaticity of the highly reduced species,we reported a series of highly conjugated and inexpensive arylene diimide derivatives(NDI,PDI,and TPDI)as novel two-electron storage anolyte materials for ultrastable AORFBs.Matched with(ferrocenylmethyl)trimethylammonium chloride(FcNCl)as catholyte,arylene diimide derivative-based AORFBs showed the highest stability in two-electron AORFBs to date.The NDI/FcNCl-based AORFB delivered 98.44%capacity retention at 40 mA cm^(−2)for 350 cycles;TPDI/FcNCl-based AORFB also showed remarkable stability with 97.22%capacity retention at 20 mA cm^(−2)over 200 cycles.This finding lays the theoretical foundation and offers a reference for improving the stability of two-electron AORFBs.

Progress of organic,inorganic redox flow battery and mechanism of electrode reaction

With the deployment of renewable energy and the increasing demand for power grid modernization,redox flow battery has attracted a lot of research interest in recent years.Among the available energy storage technologies,the redox flow battery is considered the most promising candidate battery due to its unlimited capacity,design flexibility,and safety.In this review,we summarize the latest progress and improvement strategies of common inorganic redox flow batteries,such as vanadium redox flow batteries,iron-chromium redox flow batteries,and zinc-based redox flow batteries,including electrolyte,membrane,electrode,structure design,etc.In addition,we introduce the latest progress in aqueous and non-aqueous organic redox flow batteries.We also focus on the modification mechanism,optimization design,improvement strategy,and modeling method of the redox flow battery reaction.Finally,this review presents a brief summary,challenges,and perspectives of the redox flow battery.

A high potential biphenol derivative cathode: toward a highly stable air-insensitive aqueous organic flow battery

Aqueous organic flow batteries have attracted dramatic attention for stationary energy storage due to their resource sustainability and low cost. However, the current reported systems can normally be operated stably under a nitrogen or argon atmosphere due to their poor stability. Herein a stable airinsensitive biphenol derivative cathode, 3,30,5,50-tetramethylaminemethylene-4,40-biphenol(TABP), with high solubility(>1.5 mol L^(-1)) and redox potential(0.91 V vs. SHE) is designed and synthesized by a scalable one-step method. Paring with silicotungstic acid(SWO), an SWO/TABP flow battery shows a stable performance of zero capacity decay over 900 cycles under the air atmosphere. Further, an SWO/TABP flow battery manifests a high rate performance with an energy efficiency of 85% at a current density of60 m A cm^(-2) and a very high volumetric capacity of more than 47 Ah L^(-1). This work provides a new and practical option for next-generation practical large-scale energy storage.