Materials Design for High‐Safety Sodium‐Ion Battery

Abstract

Sodium‐ion batteries, with their evident superiority in resource abundance and cost, are emerging as promising next‐generation energy storage systems for large‐scale applications, such as smart grids and low‐speed electric vehicles. Accidents related to fires and explosions for batteries are a reminder that safety is prerequisite for energy storage systems, especially when aiming for grid‐scale use. In a typical electrochemical secondary battery, the electrical power is stored and released via processes that generate thermal energy, leading to temperature increments in the battery system, which is the main cause for battery thermal abuse. The investigation of the energy generated during the chemical/electrochemical reactions is of paramount importance for battery safety, unfortunately, it has not received the attention it deserves. In this review, the fundamentals of the heat generation, accumulation, and transportation in a battery system are summarized and recent key research on materials design to improve sodium‐ion battery safety is highlighted. Several effective materials design concepts are also discussed. This review is designed to arouse the attention of researcher and scholars and inspire further improvements in battery safety.

Designing Advanced Vanadium‐Based Materials to Achieve Electrochemically Active Multielectron Reactions in Sodium/Potassium‐Ion Batteries

“…The five aspects are carefully examined and compared with other electrode materials for both SIBs and PIBs. [ 7,43–46 ] Nevertheless, how to uniformly maintain the well‐decorated carbon network and retain the highly pure phase of the electrodes on the industrial level is very challenging. The continuous rotary kiln process can be considered as an effective approach at industrial level.…”

Advanced High‐Performance Potassium–Chalcogen (S, Se, Te) Batteries

“…Despite extensive applications in portable electronics and remarkable commercial success of lithium ion batteries, the extreme scarcity, uneven distribution, and high cost of lithium resources that are rapidly consumed in lithium ion battery industrial manufacture have caused great concerns on undersupply of sustainable lithium storage devices. [ 1 ] In order to meet the demand for energy storage market, exploitation of alternative energy storage systems with long‐term sustainability, cost‐effectiveness, and high energy density is quite urgent and important, such as sodium ion batteries, [ 2 ] sodium–sulfur batteries, [ 3 ] potassium ion batteries (PIBs), [ 4 ] zinc ion batteries, [ 5 ] aluminum ion batteries, [ 6 ] and magnesium ion batteries. [ 7 ] In very recent years, potassium, which lies in the same group with lithium, begins to come into scientists’ view due to their unique advantages.…”

N, S self‐doped porous carbon with enlarged interlayer distance as anode for high performance sodium ion batteries

“…However, their cost disadvantage and limited global abundance cannot meet the continuous demand in large grid energy storage system 3 . As the new choice to replace LIBs in large scale stationary applications, sodium ion batteries (SIBs) were paid more and more attentions recently, because of the abundance of raw materials and safety 4‐10 . If a rechargeable sodium‐ion battery with good performance characteristics could be developed, it could have the advantage of using electrolyte systems of lower decomposition potential due to the higher half‐reaction potential for sodium relative to lithium 5,6 .…”

“…Robinson et al found that the self‐heating rate in a Na‐ion pouch cell is significantly slower than that in a commercial LiCoO 2 pouch cell and the thermal runaway process is less exothermic for Na‐ion cells, indicating that SIBs could be a potentially safer option compared with LIBs 10 . Unfortunately, the larger Na + radius (1.02 Å) caused the slower diffusion kinetics, structure damage, and severe volume expansion during the electrochemical reaction process, resulting in the low coulombic efficiency, low‐grade rate capability, and inferior storage capacity 5 . For example, the crystalline Sn nanoparticles are sodiated with Na to form Na 15 Sn 4 alloy with a great volumetric expansion of 420% 11 .…”