Li Chen, Xin Yalu, Gao Wei, Chen Yongping
Key Laboratory of Energy Thermal Conversion and Control of Ministry of Education, School of Energy and Environment, Southeast University, Nanjing, Jiangsu, 210096, P. R. China.
Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Micro and Nano Heat Fluid Flow Technology and Energy Application, School of Environmental Science and Engineering, Suzhou University of Science and Technology, Suzhou, Jiangsu, 215009, P. R. China.
Small. 2025 Aug 27:e08359. doi: 10.1002/smll.202508359.
The growing demand for grid-scale energy storage calls for safe and low-cost solutions, for which zinc-iodine flow batteries (ZIFBs) are highly promising. However, their practical application is critically hindered by two issues: accumulation of insoluble solid iodine at the cathode and zinc dendrite growth at the anode. While halide-rich electrolyte can address the former, the anode instabilities remain a major obstacle. Here, a holistic solution is presented by introducing a dual-function additive, glucosamine sulfate (GS), into a halide-rich electrolyte. GS reconfigures the Zn solvation structure by displacing coordinated water to accelerate Zn deposition kinetics, while preferentially adsorbing on the anode surface to form a water-poor layer that inhibits parasitic side reactions and guides uniform, crystallographically-oriented deposition along the Zn (002) crystal plane. As a result, a ZIFB with a zero-excess zinc anode and anolyte demonstrates robust durability, surpassing 500 cycles at 40 mA cm and 30 mAh cm. This delivers an attractive cumulative plating capacity of 15 Ah cm with a near-theoretical Coulombic efficiency of 99.6% and a high energy efficiency of 81.9%. This electrolyte engineering strategy, which stabilizes the anode within an advanced cathode chemistry, paves the way for highly durable and practical high-energy flow batteries.
对电网规模储能的需求不断增长，需要安全且低成本的解决方案，锌碘液流电池（ZIFB）在这方面极具潜力。然而，它们的实际应用受到两个问题的严重阻碍：阴极处不溶性固体碘的积累和阳极处锌枝晶的生长。虽然富含卤化物的电解质可以解决前者，但阳极不稳定性仍然是一个主要障碍。在此，通过将双功能添加剂硫酸葡萄糖胺（GS）引入富含卤化物的电解质中，提出了一种整体解决方案。GS通过取代配位水来重新配置锌溶剂化结构，以加速锌沉积动力学，同时优先吸附在阳极表面形成贫水层，抑制寄生副反应，并引导沿Zn（002）晶面的均匀、晶体取向沉积。结果，具有零过量锌阳极和阳极电解液的ZIFB表现出强大的耐久性 在40 mA/cm²和30 mAh/cm²下超过500次循环。这提供了15 Ah/cm²的诱人累积镀覆容量，接近理论库仑效率99.6%和高能效81.9%。这种在先进阴极化学中稳定阳极的电解质工程策略，为高耐久性和实用的高能液流电池铺平了道路。
