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Pathways for practical high-energy long-cycling lithium metal batteries

Nature Energy volume 4, pages 180–186 (2019)Cite this article

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Abstract

State-of-the-art lithium (Li)-ion batteries are approaching their specific energy limits yet are challenged by the ever-increasing demand of today’s energy storage and power applications, especially for electric vehicles. Li metal is considered an ultimate anode material for future high-energy rechargeable batteries when combined with existing or emerging high-capacity cathode materials. However, much current research focuses on the battery materials level, and there have been very few accounts of cell design principles. Here we discuss crucial conditions needed to achieve a specific energy higher than 350 Wh kg−1, up to 500 Wh kg−1, for rechargeable Li metal batteries using high-nickel-content lithium nickel manganese cobalt oxides as cathode materials. We also provide an analysis of key factors such as cathode loading, electrolyte amount and Li foil thickness that impact the cell-level cycle life. Furthermore, we identify several important strategies to reduce electrolyte-Li reaction, protect Li surfaces and stabilize anode architectures for long-cycling high-specific-energy cells.

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Fig. 1: Calculated cell-level specific energy as a function of cell parameters.
Fig. 2: Relation between cell parameters and cell cycle life and Li anode morphologies.
Fig. 3: Illustration of major failure mechanisms in Li metal anodes.
Fig. 4: Solutions proposed in the literature to characterize and mitigate Li metal problems.

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Acknowledgements

This research was supported by the Assistant Secretary for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, Office of Vehicle Technologies of the US Department of Energy through the Advanced Battery Materials Research (BMR) Program (Battery500 Consortium) under contract no. DE-AC02-05CH11231. The authors thank H. Pan, H. Lee, C. Niu and B. Liu of Pacific Northwest National Laboratory for their assistance in preparing this manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Energy and Environment Directorate, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Richland, WA, USA

    Jun Liu, Qiuyan Li, Venkat R. Subramanian, Vilayanur V. Viswanathan, Jie Xiao, Wu Xu & Ji-Guang Zhang

  2. Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA

    Zhenan Bao & Yi Cui

  3. Clean Energy and Transportation Division, Idaho National Laboratory, Idaho Falls, ID, USA

    Eric J. Dufek & Bor Yann Liaw

  4. Department of Mechanical Engineering, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX, USA

    John B. Goodenough & Arumugam Manthiram

  5. Chemistry Division, Brookhaven National Laboratory, Upton, NY, USA

    Peter Khalifah & Xiao-Qing Yang

  6. Department of NanoEngineering, University of California, San Diego, CA, USA

    Ping Liu & Y. Shirley Meng

  7. College of Engineering, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA

    Venkat R. Subramanian & Jihui Yang

  8. Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Menlo Park, CA, USA

    Michael F. Toney

  9. Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Binghamton University, Binghamton, NY, USA

    M. Stanley Whittingham

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Correspondence to Jun Liu.

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Liu, J., Bao, Z., Cui, Y. et al. Pathways for practical high-energy long-cycling lithium metal batteries. Nat Energy 4, 180–186 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41560-019-0338-x

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