Redox Flow Battery Simulations for Optimizing Separator Membrane Performance

The redox flow battery (RFB) is being developed as a large-scale energy storage system to facilitate the integration of highly variable alternative energy sources such as wind and solar into the electrical grid. Optimization of the RFB requires evaluation of new electrochemical materials, electrode and separator materials, geometrical parameters such as cell dimensions and electrode porosity, and the operating conditions such as current density and electrolyte flow. A flexible computationally efficient model of the Vanadium RFB has been developed to gain insight into energy losses mechanisms and methods to optimize cell efficiency. A membrane model has been developed which utilizes concentrated-solution theory to refine membrane transport coefficients used as input parameters for the full cell RFB model.