Failure Mechanism for Fast‐Charged Lithium Metal Batteries with Liquid Electrolytes

In recent years, the Li metal anode has regained a position of paramount research interest because of the necessity for employing Li metal in next‐generation battery technologies such as Li‐S and Li‐O 2 . Severely limiting this utilization, however, are the rapid capacity degradation and safety issues associated with rechargeable Li metal anodes. A fundamental understanding of the failure mechanism of Li metal at high charge rates has remained elusive due to the complicated interfacial chemistry that occurs between Li metal and liquid electrolytes. Here, it is demonstrated that at high current density the quick formation of a highly resistive solid electrolyte interphase (SEI) entangled with Li metal, which…

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  Argonne National Laboratory