Structural Supercapacitor: A Proof of Concept and Performance Characterisation

Structural Supercapacitor: A Proof of Concept and Performance Characterisation

Chen, Sian Ying (TU Delft Aerospace Engineering)

Masania, K. (mentor)
Dransfeld, C.A. (graduation committee)
Castro, Saullo G.P. (graduation committee)

Delft University of Technology

Aerospace Engineering

2023-06-28

A structural supercapacitor (SSC) is a composite material that bears mechanical loads and stores energy, and its encapsulation method of the device is vital for scale-up. Here we present an SSC with an encapsulation interface consisting of spread-tow fabric electrodes and glass fabric encapsulators infused with epoxy resin. Through surface functionalisation of fibres, a high surface area electrode of 231.43 𝑚2/𝑔 was separated by a gel polymer electrolyte (GPE) separator and encapsulated in an epoxy polymer. To study the SSC’s performance, different GPEs are produced by adding lithium bis(trifluoromethanesulfonyl)imide (LiTFSI) into poly(vinylidene fluoride-co-hexafluoropropylene) (PVDF-HFP). The LiTFSI concentration is varied from 0% to 100% based on the weight of PVDF-HFP. The highest energy storage performance occurred at LiTFSI 60 wt% in the PVDF-HFP, with a cell-specific capacitance of 25.72 mF/g, cell-specific energy of 2.08 mWh/kg and cell-specific power of 25.04 mW/kg. With a flexural modulus of 3.39 GPa and a flexural strength of 52.07 MPa, this further develops high-performance SSCs in the future.

Structural power composite
Structural supercapacitor
Energy Storage
Aerospace Composite Structures

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:9bb5ca61-8574-4c34-aad4-30946753c3f3

2023-12-28

Student theses

master thesis

© 2023 Sian Ying Chen