OptiLIB

OptiLIB – Development and application of innovative surface-analytical methods for optimizing the aging behavior in lithium-ion batteries.

Lithium-ion (LIB) batteries are the only commercially available energy storage systems that offer both high energy density and high cycle stability. These characteristics are the basis for the high economic importance of LIBs for the rapidly growing market of electric mobility. However, the commercial applicability of LIB is limited by decreasing performance when it is used for a longer period. The reasons for aging appear deposits on the battery electrodes and separators..

Within the just introduced project, surface analytical techniques are developed and used and those allow that the aging behavior of LIB are examined for the first time. Up to now this kind of aging has been poorly understood. It is necessary to develop high performance analysis techniques for the sensitive identification of the chemical composition of surfaces affected by aging and to use it under LIB relevant terms as e.g. the influence of different additives from the modern LIB research.

An imaging analysis of the surfaces is to be developed on a macroscopic scale under atmospheric pressure (ADI-MS1) and on a nanoscopic and microscopic scale under ultra-high vacuum (ToF-SIMS2 and LEIS3). The high-resolution analysis of the depth distribution by means of ToF-SIMS and pGD-OES4 is intended to enable the precise three-dimensional recording of the chemical composition of the various LIB components with a depth resolution in the nm range.

The aim of the project is to develop an innovative analytical instrument and to make it available for LIB investigations. The detailed LIB studies carried out in the project clarify the aging processes and allow a better selection of materials and additives in LIB development.

¹ADI-MS: Ambient Desorption/ Ionization Mass Spectrometry
²ToF-SIMS: Time-of-Flight Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry
³LEIS: Low Energy Ion Scattering
⁴pGD-OES: pulsed Glow Discharge-Optical Emission
Spectroscopy

Term: January 1, 2012- June 30, 2015
Volume of the project: 1,968,343€

. Juni 2015
Projektvolumen: 1.968.343 €