New Battery Technology Could Provide Large-Scale Energy Storage for the Grid

New Battery Technology Could Provide Large-Scale Energy Storage for the Grid

I, like many others, have been following the work being done by Yi Cui at Stanford University in improving battery technology. Cui’s work has often aimed at improving Li-ion battery technology, much in the same way researchers at Northwestern University recently have done in getting a silicon-graphene sandwich to act as a more effective anode. But in his most recent research he has abandoned the use of lithium ions and replaced them with either sodium or potassium ions for his new battery technology. The result is a battery that Cui and his colleagues claim is able to retain 83% of its charge after 40,000 cycles, which compares more than favorably to Li-ion batteries of 1,000 cycles. The researchers have been able to develop a cathode material that they can essentially mix in a flask by combining iron with cyanide and then replacing half of the iron with copper then making...

Full article: http://spectrum.ieee.org/nanoclast/semiconductors/nanotec...