Closed Battery Systems

As described in previous chapters, today the dominant position in the industry and the global market is represented by Li-ion batteries. Among the several battery emerging technologies some of them are very promising and closer to the commercialization. Li-metal batteries, solid-state and beyond lithium technologies are the main topics discussed in this chapter. Lithium-metal represents a source for substantially increase the energy density of batteries, but the formation of dendrites limits the correct function of the system. On the other hand, using a solid electrolyte, as in all solid state batteries, can make the cell more stable in terms of safety, but decrease the kinetics of the ion migration between the cathode and the anode. Moreover, the innovative technologies called beyond lithium use different ions to transport electrons for energy storage, such as Na, Al, Zn completely removing the use of lithium by using more abundant elements in the earth's crust. However, changing the technology behind current lithium batteries introduces a series of issues that have never been addressed until now. In this chapter we cover all of these aspects giving an overview of the main advances in these fields with reference to the closed systems.