Zinc-iron flow batteries are one of the most promising electrochemical energy storage technologies because of their safety, stability, and low cost. This review discusses the current situations and problems of zinc-iron flow batteries. These batteries can work in a wide range of pH by adopting different varieties of iron couples. An alkaline ...
In this work, a cost model for a 0.1 MW/0.8 MWh alkaline zinc-iron flow battery system is presented, and a capital cost under the U.S. Department of Energy's target cost of 150 $ per kWh is achieved. Besides, the effects of electrode geometry, operating conditions, and membrane types on the system cost are investigated.
Therefore, tremendous efforts should be made to improve the working current density, such as increasing the specific surface area of electrodes, adopting membranes with high ion conductivity, or improving the conductivity of supporting electrolytes . Fig. 3. Capital cost for 0.1MW/0.8 MWh zinc-iron flow battery system. 4.2. Cost comparisons
Zinc-iron redox flow battery Zinc–Iron RFB (ZIRFB) is proposed as a result of the ideal electrochemical properties of zinc, including high overpotential of hydrogen evolution reaction, negative potential, and fast kinetics [84, 85]. In the earth's crust, iron and zinc are the elements with abundant reserves [34, 85].
It is worth noting that the working current density of alkaline Zn-Fe flow batteries is ranging from 35 to 160 mA cm−2 . In this range, the capital costs of all flow rates are under 150 $ kWh −1, which meets the DOE's target cost for energy storage technologies.
Among them, the zinc–iron RFB (ZIRFB) has become the research object because of its abundant raw materials, low cost, and non-toxicity. Xie et al. estimated that the cost of ZIRFB is approximately USD 43.3 per kWh, and is the lowest capital cost in reported RFBs (see Figure 1 a) [ 44, 45 ]. Figure 1.
Especially, zinc-iron flow batteries have significant advantages such as low price, non-toxicity, and stability compared with other aqueous flow batteries. Significant technological progress has been made in zinc-iron flow batteries in recent years.