Effect of Acetylene Black Content to Half Cells Li-ion Battery Performance Based on Li₄Ti₅O₁₂ using Li₂CO₃ as Lithium Ion Source with Hydrothermal Mechanochemical Process

Lithium titanate (Li₄Ti₅O₁₂)/LTO is a promising candidate to be used as anode electrode in Li-ion battery, to replace graphite in Li-ion battery application. Crystal structure of lithium titanate/LTO is more stable or undergoes less strain than graphite during intercalation and de-intercalation process Li⁺ ions. However, although lithium titanate has good stability, the material has low electrical conductivity and lithium ion diffusion. The purpose of this research is to synthesis the spinel LTO using combinated hydrothermal and mechanochemical processes from xerogel TiO₂. Then, to increase the conductivity, in the half-cell battery assembly process it was added acetylene black conductive (AB) additive with various from 10%, to 15% in wt. The LTO obtained were characterized using scanning electron microscope (SEM), X-Ray Diffraction (XRD) and Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET). The XRD showed a rutile as minor phase, while SEM showed homogeneous distribution of particle with an average particle size of 0.35 μm. The BET showed that the surface area of LTO formed is 2.26 m²/g. The assembled coin half cells used this Li₄Ti₅O₁₂ as a cathode and lithium metal foil as the anode were tested using electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS), cyclic voltammetry (CV) and charge discharge (CD). The conductivity value obtained from EIS corresponds to the contents of AB. Meanwhile, the CV and CD testing showed that higher percentage of AB causing the decrease of battery specific capacity. The highest specific capacity at the rate of 10C is obtained at the mixture of 10wt% AB with the value of 40.91 mAh/g.