Researchers explained that demand for renewable energy and electric vehicles is driving high
“A huge amount ofthe number of batteries, it will sooner or later lead to environmental problems, - said the lead author of the article Liangbing Hu, director of the Center for Materials Innovation at the University of Maryland. “For example, polypropylene and polycarbonate materials take hundreds or even thousands of years to decompose.”
Batteries use electrolyte tomovement of ions between positively and negatively charged terminals. The electrolyte can be a liquid, paste, or gel, and many batteries use flammable or corrosive chemicals for this function. The new battery, which can store energy from large-scale wind and solar sources, uses a gel electrolyte made from a biological material called chitosan.
Chitosan is a derivative of chitin.Chitin can be extracted in many ways, such as from the cell walls of fungi, exoskeletons of crustaceans and squid. The biodegradable electrolyte means that about two-thirds of the battery can be destroyed by microbes - this chitosan electrolyte was completely destroyed within five months.
The researchers want to continue working on making batteries even greener.
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