STTR Phase II:Multi-Electron Intercalation Reactions for High Capacity Lithium Batteries

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Phase II project is to advance the performance and decrease the cost of batteries for applications in electrified vehicles. Reinventing cathode materials of rechargeable batteries is an important because the cathode is the most expensive material in a battery and often performance limiting. Cathodes cost more than all the other battery materials combined. This new class of high performance, low-cost vanadium cathodes will be used in lithium ion batteries. Vanadium also benefits from high availability, domestic sourcing, and existing capacity for the recycling of spent vanadium to establish a circular battery ecosystem. The proposed batteries may benefit electrified vehicles by increasing range, enabling fast charging, improving safety, and reducing cost. More broadly, a wide range of applications in consumer electronics, medical electronics, military and defense systems, and energy storage are envisioned.This Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Phase II project proposes to develop a high performance, multi-electron battery cathode. This lithium ion battery's cathode is a new tunnel structured vanadium based material. Commercially available battery chemistries are often limited to just one electron reaction per intercalation site and this limits performance. Lithium batteries that reversibly enable multi-electron intercalation of lithium ions are needed to improve gravimetric and volumetric energy density. Specifically, the proposed project will scale up the synthetic method to produce multi-electron vanadium based cathodes, evaluate multi-electron cathodes paired with lithium metal and/or silicon for electrochemical performance, and explore various battery components and surface modifications to mitigate oxidation of electrolyte and transition metal dissolution.The project will also optimize battery performance based on a design of experiments approach. Addressing these technical gaps and challenges will lead to more advanced multi-electron pouch cell batteries.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.