Research Projects

To curb the escalating energy crisis, it is essential to exploit clean, secure, and efficient renewable energy technologies. Hybrid-ion capacitors (HICs) are one such high-power energy storage technology, which amalgamates the best of both high-energy batteries and high-power supercapacitors. At present, Li-based HICs have been the most investigated devices. However, the growing concern about lithium shortage, and owing to the sodium chemistry, nowadays more attention pays to the development of sodium ion capacitors (NICs). Nonetheless, NICs are still at an infant stage compared to other storage technologies and need considerable advancement. In the "sILsACap" project we aim to develop a safe, high power and energy NIC exhibiting very high cycling of 15,000 with greater than 90% capacity retention towards practical application. The indented work is categorized into three work packages which involve (i) the realization of a hard carbon battery electrode-based NIC with an activated carbon capacitor electrode by (ii) optimizing the electrolytes with safe glyme-based solvated ionic-liquid binary mixtures, in combination with (iii) the novel Na-rich conjugated sulfonamides (Na-rich CsAs) as sacrificial organic agents for pre-sodiation. Additionally, this project is also devoted to fundamental studies, which include the understanding of synchronous charge/discharge mechanisms at both electrodes, electrode/electrolyte interface analysis, aging, and self-discharge mechanism of each electrode under different operational conditions. Besides, the successful completion of this project will contribute to the advancement of sustainable Na-storage devices, which is an essential requirement of the future post-lithium era.