Improving the specific energy of Li-Ion capacitor laminate cell using hybrid activated Carbon/LiNi0.5Co0.2Mn0.3O2 as positive electrodes

In this work, we investigated the performance impact of LiNi0.5Co0.2Mn0.3O2 (NMC) as an additive to activated carbon (AC) electrodes within a high-performance Li-ion capacitor (LIC) fabricated with activated carbon positive electrodes (PEs) and hard carbon negative electrodes (NEs) having lithium thin films as Li sources loaded on the surface of the negative electrodes. The NMC additive impact in initial testing showed an increase in specific energy of the LIC of nearly 50.5% with a 32% maximum specific power loss. Contrary to its typical low rate battery decay at high rate cycling the cell having a hybrid PE is still able to maintain over 90% capacity at a 0.7C rate after 11,000 cycles at rate of 18C and an additional 9000 cycles at a rate of 36C. We conclude at high rate cycling minimal impacts occurs to the NMC properties which can be seen with low rate intercepts.