Development of an adhesion model for graphite-based lithium-ion battery anodes

Lithium-ion Batteries (LIBs) have become a key technology for energy storage in electromobility or stationary applications. However, lifetime, energy density and production costs of LIBs need to be improved in order to satisfy the growing demands of these applications. Two possible approaches to improving the specific energy are the use of thicker electrode coatings or the use of high capacity materials such as silicon. Unfortunately, these two levers lead to a decrease of the adhesion strength of the electrodes which compromises the lifetime of a cell and leads to high production scrap. That is why a lot of research activity is directed at improving the adhesion strength of electrodes. However, due to the high complexity of the physics of adhesion, further investigations are necessary. In this work, a thorough analysis of adhesion theories is conducted and supplemented by an expert survey in order to select significant influencing factors of the adhesion strength of graphite-based anodes. The investigation of the influence of the boundary layer properties on the adhesion strength constitutes the focus of the present work. The obtained results are presented in a mathematical-empirical adhesion model for graphite-based anodes.