In a study, the Ohio researchers detailed their findings focusing around the construction of the battery's cathode, which stores the energy produced by a chemical reaction in a metal-oxygen or metal-air battery.
"If you want to go to an all-renewable option for the power grid, you need economical energy storage devices that can store excess power and give that power back out when you don't have the source ready or working," said Vishnu-Baba Sundaresan, co-author of the study and professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at Ohio State. "Technology like this is key, because it is cheap, it doesn't use any exotic materials, and it can be made anywhere and promote the local economy."
However, in order for renewable energy to be reliable sources of power for a region's energy grid, there needs to be a way to store excess energy gathered from sunshine and wind.
Companies, scientists and governments around the world are working on storage solutions, ranging from lithium-ion batteries (bigger versions of those in many electric vehicles), to giant batteries the size of a big-box store made using the metal vanadium.
