Development of thin film for aluminium- air battery

Wong, Ryan Kok Seng (2024) Development of thin film for aluminium- air battery. Final Year Project, UTAR.

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Abstract

The advent of the Fourth Industrial Revolution (IR 4.0) drives a significant increase in energy demand, highlighting the limitations of fossil fuels and the urgent need for renewable energy and advance storage solutions. While Lithium-Ion batteries dominate the battery market, their toxic chemical content contributes to environmental pollution during production and disposal, highlighting the need for more sustainable practices and greener alternatives. Aluminium-air batteries (AABs) present a promising alternative due to their high energy density, specific capacity, and environmental advantages. However, AABs face challenges such as rapid anodic corrosion in alkaline solutions, significant hydrogen gas evolution, and electrolyte leakage. To address these issues and reduce environmental impact, this study explores the use of nanocellulose-incorporated gel electrolytes as a thin film for AABs. Various thin films cellulose gel electrolyte with differing thicknesses, nanocellulose content, and KOH concentrations were fabricated, and the electrochemical properties of AABs using these films were analysed. Furthermore, the Al-air battery incorporated with thin film cellulose gel electrolyte are subjected to battery performance analysis including polarization test, constant current discharge test, corrosion test, water absorption test, shrinkage test, reusability test and Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) Analysis. The results reveal that the incorporation of nanocellulose into gel electrolyte achieve an open circuit voltage (OCV) of 1.86 V and enhances the peak power density of Al-air battery to 91 mW as compared to 55 mW from the gel electrolyte without nanocellulose. The discharging time for the thin film cellulose gel electrolyte also improved significantly to 95 minutes with 10 mA of discharging current. Additionally, with the investigation of the effect of gel electrolyte thickness, effect of nanocellulose content and effect of potassium hydroxide concentration on the performance of Al-air battery, it reveals the thin film cellulose gel electrolyte with 10 wt% nanocellulose content, thickness of 20 ml content volume and 3 M of potassium hydroxide deliver the best performance among all the gel electrolyte fabricated. With an open circuit voltage (OCV) of 1.95 V, the battery was able to maintain a discharging period around 7 and half hours along with a peak power density of 187 mW.

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