Carbon coated stainless steel mesh as a low-cost and corrosion-resistant current collector for aqueous rechargeable batteries

Low-cost and chemically stable stainless steel mesh is used widely as a current collector in aqueous batteries, but is not electrochemically stable due to the oxygen evolution corrosion reaction. Here we report C-coated stainless steel (CSS) mesh as a corrosion-resistant current collector using a multi-functional binder, NaPAA, in aqueous lithium-ion battery cathodes. The results show that the corrosion potential of the CSS mesh is shifted positively to a large extent, indicating the suppression of oxygen evolution at high potentials. Thereby, C-coated stainless steel mesh based electrodes show better rate capability and cycling stability than those fabricated on traditional stainless steel mesh, graphite-emulsion coated stainless steel mesh and even titanium mesh based current collectors, especially at ultrahigh current densities. The plausibility of using such low-cost and green corrosion-resistant current collectors for aqueous batteries marks an important step toward industrial applications for low-cost, safe and large-scale energy storage.