Conventional iron-air batteries are very energy dense, inexpensive, and safe, but cannot discharge very quickly compared to other types of batteries. We hypothesize that the anode in iron-air batteries can be made to discharge more quickly if iron coatings are deposited on the pore walls of carbon nanofoams because iron coatings that conform to interfaces with high surface area will electrochemically oxidize more quickly than the bulk iron powders in conventional iron-air batteries. We successfully synthesized large-pore carbon nanofoams (LPCNFs) and chemically deposited iron oxide onto them using an established aqueous deposition. The resulting Fe-LPCNFs are uniformly filled with iron oxide (SEM/EDS, XRD) that can be reversibly reduced and oxidized (CV). Iron-LPCNFs discharge up to 276 mAh g-1, but their capacity decreases over 15 cycles. Research continues in our lab to determine whether the high-surface area iron discharges more rapidly than bulk iron electrodes.

Increasing capacitor and battery performance through metal deposition onto porous nanomaterials

245th National Meeting (2013)

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