Sintering and Electrochemical Properties of Hydrogen Storage Alloys in the System Mg-Ni

We synthesized ceramic-type Mg2Ni alloys (hydrogen storage alloy) by sintering at high temperature in Ar atmosphere and applied the sintered materials to the anode of the metal hydride batteries. As a result, it was found that the samples were obtained as sintered alloys, mainly composed of hexagonal phase with a little MgO. The discharge capacity of the sintered sample was more than 150 mAhg(-1) on the 1(st) cycle. It decreased to lower than 50 mAhg(-1) after a few cycles, but the capacity was maintained over 20 cycles. The cycling capacity retention is due to the packed fusion of the alloy particles by sintering, which denotes a good effect of sintering method to prepare alloy materials.