Abstract:
In the last two decades, Li-ion batteries have been developed
with high energy and power densities to satisfy the need of electrochemical
energy storage for portable electronics as well as automobiles. However,
the limited natural resources of lithium raw materials compelled researchers
to investigate alternative battery chemistries beyond lithium-ion, such as
aluminum-ion batteries (AIBs). In this work, a set of novel gel-polymer
electrolytes (GPEs) based on poly ethylene oxide (PEO) host polymer have
been synthesized and characterized by electrochemical impedance
spectroscopy and DC polarization techniques. Aluminium sulphate (Al2
(SO4)3) is used as the ionic salt to get mobile ions within the polymer
matrix. The optimized 8PEO10Al2 (SO4)3-40EC-42PC (wt. %) GPE
composition showed an ambient temperature ionic conductivity of 2.54 x
10-4 S cm-1. Ionic conductivity versus inverse temperature variation
showed Arrhenius behavior with almost same activation energies of 0.15
eV for all the compositions studied in this work. DC polarization test on
SS/GPE/SS configuration showed that the highest conducting composition
is dominantly an ionic conductor (tion ~ 0.99) with negligible electronic
conductivity, which is highly needed to avoid short circuits within the cell.
