Electrochemical Behavior of Vanadium Ions in Molten LiCl-KCl

Abstract Electrochemical behavior of V(III) in LiCl-KCl-VCl3 at 450 oC was investigated through a variety of electrochemical methods including cyclic voltammetry, square wave voltammetry and chronopotentiometry. The reduction process was found that the V(III) was firstly reduced to V(II), then further reduced to metallic V, and the V(III) was also reduced to metallic V directly, all reduction processes were controlled by diffusion. The diffusion coefficient of V(III) was also measured at 450 oC. The nucleation of vanadium belongs to the progressive nucleation on tungsten electrode. Constant voltage electrolysis of 300 min was performed in LiCl-KCl-VCl3 and metallic vanadium was obtained. The electrolytic products were analyzed by scanning electron microscope (SEM) and X-ray diffraction(XRD).