High-Performance Flexible Solid-State Ni/Fe Battery Consisting of Metal Oxides Coated Carbon Cloth/Carbon Nanofiber Electrodes

Aqueous Ni/Fe batteries have great potential as flexible energy storage devices, owing to their low cost, low toxicity, high safety, and high energy density. However, the poor cycling stability has limited the widely expected application of Ni/Fe batteries, while the use of heavy metal substrates cannot meet the basic requirement for flexible devices. In this work, a flexible type of solid-state Ni/Fe batteries with high energy and power densities is rationally developed using needle-like Fe₃O₄ and flake-like NiO directly grown on carbon cloth/carbon nanofiber (CC–CF) matrix as the anode and cathode, respectively. The hierarchical CC–CF substrate with high electric conductivity and good flexibility serves as an ideal support for guest active materials of nanocrystalline Fe₃O₄ and NiO, which can effectively buffer the volume change giving rise to good cycling ability. By utilizing a gel electrolyte, a robust and mechanically flexible quasi-solid-state Ni/Fe full cell can be assembled. It demonstrates optimal electrochemical performance, such as high energy density (5.2 mWh cm⁻³ and 94.5 Wh Kg⁻¹), high power density (0.64 W cm⁻³ and 11.8 KW Kg⁻¹), together with excellent cycling ability. This work provides an example of solid-state alkaline battery with high electrochemical performance and mechanical flexibility, holding great potential for future flexible electronic devices.