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Efficient Redox Flow Batteries for Smart Grids and Renewable Energy...
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Efficient Redox Flow Batteries for Smart Grids and Renewable Energy Storage

A special issue of Batteries (ISSN 2313-0105). This special issue belongs to the section "Battery Modelling, Simulation, Management and Application".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 January 2023) | Viewed by 14108

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Javier Rubio Garcia

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Materials Science and Metallurgy, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK
Interests: interfacial reactions in batteries, fuel cells, electrolysers, and heterogeneous catalysis; electrosynthesis of oxidants, liquid fuels, and ammonia; materials science including synthesis, characterization, and implementation in electrochemical devices; engineering of electrochemical reactors
Dr. Barun Chakrabarti

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Warwick Manufacturing Group, University of Warwick, Coventry, UK
Interests: redox flow battery; supercapacitor; lithium ion battery recycling; electrochemical engineering; wastewater treatment

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Redox flow batteries (RFBs) can decouple energy and power delivery capabilities depending on the application. Commonly studied systems include all vanadium RFBs (VRFBs), which use vanadium in different oxidation states for both half-cell reactions. Since their inception, RFBs have been heavily reliant on materials that are common standards in fuel-cell applications (e.g., Nafion membranes are still employed for most VRFBs to date, including commercialised systems). Research on standardising materials and performance outputs for RFBs are in progress, but not sufficient to allow RFB technology to create its own niche in electrochemical energy storage applications. Thus, it is imperative that this matter is very seriously taken into consideration to ensure that the key figures of merit for this technology are optimised, particularly electrolyte utilisation and energy efficiency.

In this Special Issue, we are looking for contributions helping to understand how membrane-electrode assemblies can be re-engineered to replace materials employed in the fuel cell or chlor-alkali industries to perform RFB diagnosis and suggest innovative solutions to prolong their KPIs to enhance their commercial impacts.

Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:

  • Innovative electrode engineering;
  • Membranes to replace Nafion;
  • RFB state-of-health (SOH) estimation;
  • Aqueous-based electrolytes;
  • Non-aqueous electrolytes;
  • Influence of aging on cost and environmental analysis of RFBs;
  • Hybrid flow batteries;
  • Optimal sizing and design of RFBs.

Dr. Javier Rubio Garcia
Dr. Barun Chakrabarti
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Batteries is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2700 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • electrodes
  • membranes
  • redox
  • non-aqueous
  • economics
  • geographic

Published Papers (4 papers)

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Research

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12 pages, 1690 KiB  
Article
High Performance H2−Mn Regenerative Fuel Cells through an Improved Positive Electrode Morphology
by Javier Rubio-Garcia, Anthony Kucernak, Barun Kumar Chakrabarti, Dong Zhao, Danlei Li, Yuchen Tang, Mengzheng Ouyang, Chee Tong John Low and Nigel Brandon
Batteries 2023, 9(2), 108; https://doi.org/10.3390/batteries9020108 - 03 Feb 2023
Viewed by 2032
Abstract
The effective scaling-up of redox flow batteries (RFBs) can be facilitated upon lowering the capital costs. The application of ubiquitous manganese along with hydrogen (known as H2−Mn regenerative fuel cells (RFC)) is seen as an effective solution for this purpose. Here, [...] Read more.
The effective scaling-up of redox flow batteries (RFBs) can be facilitated upon lowering the capital costs. The application of ubiquitous manganese along with hydrogen (known as H2−Mn regenerative fuel cells (RFC)) is seen as an effective solution for this purpose. Here, we aim to evaluate different positive electrodes so as to improve the key performance metrics of the H2/Mn RFC, namely electrolyte utilization, energy efficiency, and peak power densities. Commercially available carbon paper and graphite felt are used to show that the latter provides better key performance indicators (KPIs), which is consistent with the results reported for standard all-vanadium RFBs in the literature. Even better KPIs are obtained when an in-house carbon catalyst layer (CCL) is employed in combination with graphite felt electrodes (e.g., more than 80% energy efficiency, >0.5 W cm−2 peak power density and electrolyte utilization of 20 Ah L−1 for felt and carbon metal fabric (CMF), prepared by means of electrospinning and carbonization, in comparison with about 75% energy efficiency 0.45 W cm−2 peak power density and 11 Ah L−1 electrolyte utilization for felt on its own). It is envisaged that if the electrochemical performance of CCLs can be optimized then it could open up new opportunities for the commercial exploitation of H2−Mn systems. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Efficient Redox Flow Batteries for Smart Grids and Renewable Energy Storage)
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13 pages, 5948 KiB  
Article
Enhanced Surface Area Carbon Cathodes for the Hydrogen–Bromine Redox Flow Battery
by David P. Trudgeon and Xiaohong Li
Batteries 2022, 8(12), 276; https://doi.org/10.3390/batteries8120276 - 06 Dec 2022
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 2206
Abstract
The hydrogen–bromine redox flow battery is a promising energy storage technology with the potential for capital costs as low as 220 $ kWh−1 and high operational power densities in excess of 1.4 W cm−2. In this work, enhanced surface area [...] Read more.
The hydrogen–bromine redox flow battery is a promising energy storage technology with the potential for capital costs as low as 220 $ kWh−1 and high operational power densities in excess of 1.4 W cm−2. In this work, enhanced surface area bromine electrodes incorporating carbon black (CB) and graphene nanoplatelets (GnPs) on carbon paper and carbon cloth substrates were investigated, and the effect of electrolyte concentration on performance of the electrodes was studied. Carbon-black-modified electrodes are found to possess the largest electrochemically active surface areas, i.e., up to 11 times that of unmodified materials, while GnP electrodes are shown to have superior kinetic activity towards the bromine electrode reaction. In terms of performance, lower electrolyte concentrations are found to favour the improved kinetic parameters associated with graphene nanoplatelet electrodes, while highly concentrated electrolytes favour the larger electrochemically active surface area of carbon black electrodes. The optimal performance was achieved on a carbon-black-modified carbon cloth electrode in a 6 M HBr/2 M Br2 electrolyte concentration, with polarisation current densities approaching 1.6 A cm−2 at overpotentials of ±400 mV, and mean overpotentials of 364 mV during oxidation and 343 mV during reduction, resulting from bromine oxidation/reduction cycling tests at ±1.5 A cm−2. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Efficient Redox Flow Batteries for Smart Grids and Renewable Energy Storage)
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Review

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19 pages, 1352 KiB  
Review
An Overview of the Design and Optimized Operation of Vanadium Redox Flow Batteries for Durations in the Range of 4–24 Hours
by Vilayanur V. Viswanathan, Alasdair J. Crawford, Edwin C. Thomsen, Nimat Shamim, Guosheng Li, Qian Huang and David M. Reed
Batteries 2023, 9(4), 221; https://doi.org/10.3390/batteries9040221 - 06 Apr 2023
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 4359
Abstract
An extensive review of modeling approaches used to simulate vanadium redox flow battery (VRFB) performance is conducted in this study. Material development is reviewed, and opportunities for additional development identified. Various crossover mechanisms for the vanadium species are reviewed, and their effects on [...] Read more.
An extensive review of modeling approaches used to simulate vanadium redox flow battery (VRFB) performance is conducted in this study. Material development is reviewed, and opportunities for additional development identified. Various crossover mechanisms for the vanadium species are reviewed, and their effects on its state of charge and its state of health assessed. A stack design focusing on flow fields and an electrode design tailored to various flow fields are reviewed. An operational strategy that takes these parameters into account is reviewed for various operating envelopes, chosen based on end user preference in terms of minimizing capital cost or operation and maintenance cost. This work provides a framework for the design and operation of a VRFB for various grid services. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Efficient Redox Flow Batteries for Smart Grids and Renewable Energy Storage)
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0 pages, 4729 KiB  
Review
Hybrid Energy Storage Systems Based on Redox-Flow Batteries: Recent Developments, Challenges, and Future Perspectives
by Christina Schubert, Wiem Fekih Hassen, Barbara Poisl, Stephanie Seitz, Jonathan Schubert, Estanis Oyarbide Usabiaga, Pilar Molina Gaudo and Karl-Heinz Pettinger
Batteries 2023, 9(4), 211; https://doi.org/10.3390/batteries9040211 - 31 Mar 2023
Cited by 12 | Viewed by 4589
Abstract
Recently, the appeal of Hybrid Energy Storage Systems (HESSs) has been growing in multiple application fields, such as charging stations, grid services, and microgrids. HESSs consist of an integration of two or more single Energy Storage Systems (ESSs) to combine the benefits of [...] Read more.
Recently, the appeal of Hybrid Energy Storage Systems (HESSs) has been growing in multiple application fields, such as charging stations, grid services, and microgrids. HESSs consist of an integration of two or more single Energy Storage Systems (ESSs) to combine the benefits of each ESS and improve the overall system performance, e.g., efficiency and lifespan. Most recent studies on HESS mainly focus on power management and coupling between the different ESSs without a particular interest in a specific type of ESS. Over the last decades, Redox-Flow Batteries (RFBs) have received significant attention due to their attractive features, especially for stationary storage applications, and hybridization can improve certain characteristics with respect to short-term duration and peak power availability. Presented in this paper is a comprehensive overview of the main concepts of HESSs based on RFBs. Starting with a brief description and a specification of the Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) of common electrochemical storage technologies suitable for hybridization with RFBs, HESS are classified based on battery-oriented and application-oriented KPIs. Furthermore, an optimal coupling architecture of HESS comprising the combination of an RFB and a Supercapacitor (SC) is proposed and evaluated via numerical simulation. Finally, an in-depth study of Energy Management Systems (EMS) is conducted. The general structure of an EMS as well as possible application scenarios are provided to identify commonly used control and optimization parameters. Therefore, the differentiation in system-oriented and application-oriented parameters is applied to literature data. Afterwards, state-of-the-art EMS optimization techniques are discussed. As an optimal EMS is characterized by the prediction of the system’s future behavior and the use of the suitable control technique, a detailed analysis of the previous implemented EMS prediction algorithms and control techniques is carried out. The study summarizes the key aspects and challenges of the electrical hybridization of RFBs and thus gives future perspectives on newly needed optimization and control algorithms for management systems. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Efficient Redox Flow Batteries for Smart Grids and Renewable Energy Storage)
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