Rechargeable zinc-air battery will be a promising candidate to energy storage because of high energy density, low price, good safety and friendly environment. However, the cycle life of rechargeable zinc-air battery is short, mainly resulting from electrode aging. In consideration of the experimental cost and time, here we establish a flexible and expandable mathematical model for rechargeable zinc-air battery, where key factors of air electrode flooding, carbon dioxide, active material loss and zinc dendrite growth are added to the battery model to study performance degradation of the battery. The results show that the model is able to simulate the charge-discharge process of rechargeable zinc-air battery and effectively predict cycle life of the battery based on air electrode failure and morphological change of zinc electrode, demonstrating that dendrite growth is fatal to the battery lifetime, and performance attenuation of air electrode gradually deteriorates the battery performance. The model is helpful for predicting the lifetime of rechargeable metal-air batteries as well as structure optimization of rechargeable zinc-air battery.

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基于电极老化的可充电锌空气电池寿命模拟

可充电锌空气电池由于能量密度高、价格低廉、安全性好、环境友好，将成为一种很有前景的储能材料。然而，可充电锌空气电池的循环寿命较短，这主要是由电极老化造成的。考虑到实验成本和时间，我们建立了灵活且可扩展的可充电锌空气电池数学模型，在电池模型中加入了空气电极溢流、二氧化碳、活性物质损失和锌枝晶生长等关键因素，研究电池的性能退化。结果表明，该模型能够模拟可充电锌空气电池的充放电过程，并根据空气电极失效和锌电极的形貌变化有效预测电池的循环寿命，证明枝晶生长对电池是致命的空气电极的寿命和性能衰减逐渐恶化电池性能。该模型有助于预测可充电金属空气电池的寿命以及可充电锌空气电池的结构优化。