Molten Salt Batteries and Fuel Cells

Swinkels, D. A. J.

doi:10.1007/978-1-4757-0504-1_4

Cited by 27 publications

(29 citation statements)

References 80 publications

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“…Arrangements similar to the iron ring are sometimes used as well in molten salt electrolysis cells [80,24,81] to keep a patch of molten metal floating on top of fused salt while preventing contact with the rest of the cell. In the case of poorly conducting materials (especially Te and Se), the positive electrode had to be equipped with additional electronically conducting components to improve current collection [76,22].…”

Section: Thermally Regenerative Electrochemical Systemsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Using bimetallic cells as secondary elements for offpeak electricity storage was already a topic in the 1960s [10,83]. The very powerful Li||Se and Li||Te cells [75] mentioned above are, however, unsuitable for wide scale use because of the scarcity of the both chalcogens [22,85]. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, research at Argonne moved on to Li||S [86,22,85,87], thus leaving the area of bimetallic cells.…”

Section: Lmbs For Stationary Storagementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Instead, all measurements to date were made in a single liquid metal layer, without electrolyte or a second metal layer [134,135]. However, single-layer experimental models capture only a subset of the fluid mechanics of liquid metal batteries, including Joule heating but not heating via entropy change or heat of formation, which may have significant effects [22]; and including thermal convection but not compositional convection. Directly measuring the flow in the positive electrode and the electrolyte of a functioning battery would address many open questions and is a worthy goal for experimentalists.…”

Section: Open Questions and Future Directionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Fluid Mechanics of Liquid Metal Batteries

Kelley

Weier

2018

Applied Mechanics Reviews

103

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The design and performance of liquid metal batteries, a new technology for grid-scale energy storage, depend on fluid mechanics because the battery electrodes and electrolytes are entirely liquid. Here we review prior and current research on the fluid mechanics of liquid metal batteries, pointing out opportunities for future studies. Because the technology in its present form is just a few years old, only a small number of publications have so far considered liquid metal batteries specifically. We hope to encourage collaboration and conversation by referencing as many of those publications as possible here. Much can also be learned by linking to extensive prior literature considering phenomena observed or expected in liquid metal batteries, including thermal convection, magnetoconvection, Marangoni flow, interface instabilities, the Tayler instability, and electro-vortex flow. We focus on phenomena, materials, length scales, and current densities relevant to the liquid metal battery designs currently being commercialized. We try to point out breakthroughs that could lead to design improvements or make new mechanisms important.The story of fluid mechanics research in liquid metal batteries (LMBs) begins with one very important application: grid-scale storage. Electrical grids have almost no energy storage capacity, and adding storage will make them more robust and more resilient even as they incorporate increasing amounts of intermittent and unpredictable wind and solar generation. Liquid metal batteries have unique advantages as a grid-scale storage technology, but their uniqueness also means that designers must consider chemical and physical mechanisms -including fluid mechanisms -that are relevant to few other battery technologies, and in many cases not yet well-understood. We will review the fluid mechanics of liquid metal batteries, focusing on studies undertaken with that technology in mind, and also drawing extensively from prior work considering similar mechanisms in other contexts. In the interest of promoting dialogue across this new field, we have endeavored to include the work of many different researchers, though inevitably some will have eluded our search, and we ask for the reader's sympathy for regrettable omissions. Our story will be guided by technological application, focusing on mechanisms most relevant to liquid metal batteries as built for grid-scale storage. We will consider electrochemistry and theoretical fluid mechanics only briefly because excellent reviews of both topics are already available in the literature. In §1 below we provide an overview and brief introduction to liquid metal batteries, motivated by the present state of worldwide electrical grids, including the various types of liquid metal batteries that have been developed. We consider the history of liquid metal batteries in more detail in §2, connecting to the thermally regenerative electrochemical cells developed in the middle of the twentieth century. Continuing, we consider the fluid mechanisms that are most relevant to ...

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Section: Thermally Regenerative Electrochemical Systemsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Lmbs For Stationary Storagementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Open Questions and Future Directionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Fluid Mechanics of Liquid Metal Batteries

Kelley

Weier

2018

Applied Mechanics Reviews

103

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“…Although LMBs have been around for some time already, this proposal ignited a global interest for this technology; we refer to Weaver, Smith & Willmann (1962), Agruss (1963), Cairns et al (1967), Crouthamel & Recht (1967), Cairns & Shimotake (1969), Swinkels (1971), Steunenberg & Burris (2000) from Weber et al (2014) for early works on LMBs. LMBs are usually composed of three layers of fluids (liquid metal electrode-electrolyte-liquid metal electrode) of different densities stacked over each other and stabilized by gravity.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 98%

Tayler instability in liquid metal columns and liquid metal batteries

et al. 2015

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In this paper we investigate the Tayler instability in an incompressible, viscous and resistive liquid metal column and in a model of a liquid metal battery (LMB). Detailed comparisons between theory and numerics, both in linear and nonlinear regimes, are performed. We identify the timescale that is well adapted to the quasi-static (QS) regime and find the range of Hartmann numbers where this approximation applies. The scaling law Re ∼ Ha 2 for the amplitude of the Tayler destabilized flow is explained using a weakly nonlinear argument. We calculate a critical electrolyte height above which the Tayler instability is too weak to disrupt the electrolyte layer in a LMB. Applied to present day Mg-based batteries, this criterion shows that short circuits can occur only in very large batteries. Finally, preliminary results demonstrate the feasibility of direct numerical multiphase simulations of the Tayler instability in a model battery.

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“…After being intensively investigated in the 1960s, and abandoned later, LMB research experienced a renaissance some ten years ago. For an overview of the pioneering work, see [1][2][3] (recommended [4]) and for the recent work [5] and [6]. the salt acts as the electrolyte.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Electromagnetically driven convection suitable for mass transfer enhancement in liquid metal batteries

Weber

Nimtz

Personnettaz

et al. 2018

Applied Thermal Engineering

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Liquid metal batteries (LMBs) were recently proposed as cheap large scale energy storage. Such devices are urgently required for balancing highly fluctuating renewable energy sources. During discharge, intermetallic phases tend to form in the cathode of LMBs. These do not only limit the up-scalability, but also the efficiency of the cells. Generating a mild fluid flow in the fully liquid cell will smoothen concentration gradients and minimise the formation of intermetallics.In this context we study electro-vortex flow numerically. We simulate a recent LMB related experiment and discuss how the feeding lines to the cell can be optimised to enhance mass transfer. The Lorentz forces have to overcome the stable thermal stratification in the cathode of the cell; we show that thermal effects may reduce electro-vortex flow velocities considerable. Finally, we study the influence of the Earth magnetic field on the flow.

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Molten Salt Batteries and Fuel Cells

Cited by 27 publications

References 80 publications

Fluid Mechanics of Liquid Metal Batteries

Fluid Mechanics of Liquid Metal Batteries

Tayler instability in liquid metal columns and liquid metal batteries

Electromagnetically driven convection suitable for mass transfer enhancement in liquid metal batteries

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