Mitigating initial capacity loss for practical lithium-ion battery

Abstract

Rechargeable lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) with high energy and power density are urgently required for electric vehicles and aerospace industry. For such large-scale industrial applications, the development and industrial conversion of high-performance electrode materials are important considerations for improving practical battery prototype and module performance. Current commercial graphite anode materials have limited active sites for lithium accommodation and extremely low Li+ intercalation voltage (<0.1 V) and thus, have low specific capacity (372 mAh g-1) and lithium dendrite induced safety issues. While numerous promising anode materials with optimized electrochemical performance, such as fast-charging capability and long-term stability have been developed, they still suffer from low initial Coulombic efficiency (ICE) due to solid electrolyte interphase (SEI) formation and lithium trapping, which impede their commercialization. In this thesis, new insights and strategies for the two mechanisms leading to initial capacity loss (ICL) based on different type of anode materials were investigated.