Fabrication and Evaluation of Electrospun Nafion Membranes as Gel Polymer Electrolytes for High-Performance Lithium-Ion Batteries

The aim of the present study was to evaluate the potential and challenges of electrospun Nafion membranes as gel polymer electrolytes (GPEs) for application in lithium-ion batteries. The pure Nafion membranes encountered certain challenges that were successfully addressed by incorporating poly(ethylene oxide) (PEO) as a carrier polymer and poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) as an auxiliary polymer. This integration led to substantial enhancements in the membrane characteristics and overall performance. The properties of the prepared electrospun membranes were evaluated using different characterization techniques including scanning electron microscopy (SEM), tensile analysis, contact angle measurements, differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), and linear sweep voltammetry (LSV). The obtained results demonstrated that the electrospun Nafion/PVA membranes exhibited a notably high ionic conductivity of 5 mS/cm, which was considerably higher than that of recast Nafion membranes (0.22 mS/cm). Moreover, the membranes demonstrated exceptional electrochemical stability up to 7 V. Furthermore, the electrospun Nafion/PVA membranes displayed an impressive discharge capacity of approximately 117 mAh/g at 0.1 C, accompanied by remarkable long-term cyclic stability. Even after 50 cycles, the membranes maintained a Coulombic efficiency of 89%. These results highlight the superior battery performance and reliability of the developed membranes.