Boruah Buddha Deka, Wen Bo, De Volder Michael
Institute for Manufacturing, Department of Engineering, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB3 0FS, U.K.
Cambridge Graphene Centre, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB3 0FA, United Kingdom.
Nano Lett. 2021 Apr 28;21(8):3527-3532. doi: 10.1021/acs.nanolett.1c00298. Epub 2021 Apr 15.
Solar energy is one of the most actively pursued renewable energy sources, but like many other sustainable energy sources, its intermittent character means solar cells have to be connected to an energy storage system to balance production and demand. To improve the efficiency of this energy conversion and storage process, photobatteries have recently been proposed where one of the battery electrodes is made from a photoactive material that can directly be charged by light without using solar cells. Here, we present photorechargeable lithium-ion batteries (Photo-LIBs) using photocathodes based on vanadium pentoxide nanofibers mixed with P3HT and rGO additives. These photocathodes support the photocharge separation and transportation process needed to recharge. The proposed Photo-LIBs show capacity enhancements of more than 57% under illumination and can be charged to ∼2.82 V using light and achieve conversion efficiencies of ∼2.6% for 455 nm illumination and ∼0.22% for 1 sun illumination.
太阳能是最积极开发的可再生能源之一，但与许多其他可持续能源一样，其间歇性意味着太阳能电池必须连接到储能系统，以平衡生产和需求。为了提高这种能量转换和存储过程的效率，最近有人提出了光电池，其中一个电池电极由光活性材料制成，该材料可以直接通过光充电，而无需使用太阳能电池。在此，我们展示了基于五氧化二钒纳米纤维与P3HT和rGO添加剂混合的光阴极的光可充电锂离子电池（Photo-LIBs）。这些光阴极支持充电所需的光电荷分离和传输过程。所提出的Photo-LIBs在光照下容量增强超过57%，可以使用光充电至约2.82 V，对于455 nm光照实现约2.6%的转换效率，对于1个太阳光照实现约0.22%的转换效率。
