Researchers developed battery from water and clay

Researchers have developed a new, sustainable battery that works with water and clay. Although it cannot compete with the high-end products in the battery industry, it could provide valuable services in Mars missions.

No metals

The innovative battery dispenses with the traditional materials such as metals – especially lithium – that are normally required to make batteries. Instead, it is based on components that can also be easily found on the Red Planet. Batteries usually consist of metal electrodes that are stored in a solution of lithium salt. This is placed between a positively and a negatively charged electrode. The newly developed battery however, uses two graphene electrodes embedded in a mixture of water and clay.

The special highlight of this battery is its structure. The sound contains tiny channels only about a nanometer wide. These channels are filled with purified water, which behaves differently than in an open environment due to the narrow confines. In this case, the water acts as a “working fluid” that allows separation between the two oppositely charged electrodes. This means that energy can be stored.

Stately performance

What is particularly noteworthy is that in tests the battery generated a voltage of up to 1.6 volts and was able to go through up to 60,000 charging cycles without losing any efficiency. Considering the battery is made up of just clay and water, this is quite an achievement.

The researchers emphasize that they deliberately kept the design as simple as possible to ensure broad usability – possibly even on Mars. They’ve already done an analysis of the clays that are there and found that some of these materials would be compatible with the battery design.