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. 2021 Mar 17;13(6):926.
doi: 10.3390/polym13060926.

Ex-Situ Evaluation of Commercial Polymer Membranes for Vanadium Redox Flow Batteries (VRFBs)

Nana Zhao  1 , Harry Riley  1 , Chaojie Song  1 , Zhengming Jiang  1 , Keh-Chyun Tsay  1 , Roberto Neagu  1 , Zhiqing Shi  1
Affiliations

Ex-Situ Evaluation of Commercial Polymer Membranes for Vanadium Redox Flow Batteries (VRFBs)

Nana Zhao et al. Polymers (Basel). .

Abstract

Polymer membranes play a vital role in vanadium redox flow batteries (VRFBs), acting as a separator between the two compartments, an electronic insulator for maintaining electrical neutrality of the cell, and an ionic conductor for allowing the transport of ionic charge carriers. It is a major influencer of VRFB performance, but also identified as one of the major factors limiting the large-scale implementation of VRFB technology in energy storage applications due to its cost and durability. In this work, five (5) high-priority characteristics of membranes related to VRFB performance were selected as major considerable factors for membrane screening before in-situ testing. Eight (8) state-of-the-art of commercially available ion exchange membranes (IEMs) were specifically selected, evaluated and compared by a set of ex-situ assessment approaches to determine the possibility of the membranes applied for VRFB. The results recommend perfluorosulfonic acid (PFSA) membranes and hydrocarbon anion exchange membranes (AEMs) as the candidates for further in-situ testing, while one hydrocarbon cation exchange membrane (CEM) is not recommended for VRFB application due to its relatively high VO2+ ion crossover and low mechanical stability during/after the chemical stability test. This work could provide VRFB researchers and industry a valuable reference for selecting the polymer membrane materials before VRFB in-situ testing.

Keywords: chemical stability; ex-situ evaluation; membrane; proton conductivity; vanadium ion crossover; vanadium redox flow batteries (VRFBs).

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Electrolyte (1.6 M V5+ solutions in 4.0 M total sulfate) solutions and membrane samples after immersion with time.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Photograph of membranes before (top) and after (bottom) chemical stability tests.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Membrane chemical stability carried by soaking the membranes in a solution containing 1.6 M V5+ and a total of 4.0 M SO42− at 40 °C for 10 days. (a) Concentration of V4+ ions in the electrolyte solutions with time for all the investigated membranes; (b) Zoomed-in curves of (a) without CMV and VAN; (c) Concentration of V4+ ions in the electrolyte solutions normalized by the mass of the membrane against time; (d) Zoomed-in curves of (c) without CMV and VAN.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Concentration of the V4+ of eight (8) membranes at different times on the deficiency side.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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