A Lithium-Sulfur Battery using a 2D Current Collector Architecture with a Large-Sized Sulfur Host Operated under High Areal Loading and Low E/S Ratio.

TLDR: A spray-dried sulfur composite with large intrinsic internal pores, ensuring adequate local electrolyte availability, and evidence is provided that the high-frequency semicircle is mainly responsible for the often observed bypassing of the second plateau in lean electrolyte discharges.

Abstract: While backless freestanding 3D electrode architectures for batteries with high loading sulfur have flourished in the recent years, the more traditional and industrially turnkey 2D architecture has not received the same amount of attention. This work reports a spray-dried sulfur composite with large intrinsic internal pores, ensuring adequate local electrolyte availability. This material offers good performance with a electrolyte content of 7 µL mg-1 at high areal loadings (5-8 mg cm-2 ), while also offering the first reported 2.8 µL mg-1 (8 mg cm-2 ) to enter into the second plateau of discharge and continue to operate for 20 cycles. Moreover, evidence is provided that the high-frequency semicircle (i.e., interfacial resistance) is mainly responsible for the often observed bypassing of the second plateau in lean electrolyte discharges.