Advantages and disadvantages of lithium iron phosphate LiFePO4 material

Lithium-ion battery cathode materials are generally lithium oxides. LiFePO4 has been studied more. Conductive polymer cathode materials have also attracted great interest.

The material has an olivine crystal structure and is one of the popular cathode materials for lithium-ion batteries studied in recent years. Its theoretical capacity is 170mAh/g, and its actual capacity is as high as 110mAh/g without doping modification. By surface modification of LiFePO4, its actual capacity can be as high as 165mAh/g, which is very close to the theoretical capacity. 

The operating voltage range is around 3.4V. Compared with the cathode materials introduced above, LiFePO4 has high stability, is safer, more environmentally friendly and inexpensive. The main disadvantages of LiFePO4 are its low theoretical capacity and low room temperature conductivity. Based on the above reasons, LiFePO4 has very good application prospects in large-scale lithium-ion batteries. 

But to show strong market competitiveness in the entire lithium-ion battery field, LiFePO4 faces the following unfavorable factors: (1) low-cost competition from LiMn2O4, LiMnO2, LiNiMO2 cathode materials; (2) In different application fields, people may Priority should be given to choosing more suitable specific battery materials; (3) LiFePO4 has a low battery capacity; (4) In high-tech fields, people are more concerned about performance rather than cost, such as in mobile phones and notebook computers; (5) LiFePO4 is urgently needed Improve its conductivity during deep discharge at 1C speed, thereby increasing its specific capacity. (6) In terms of safety, LiCoO2 represents the current safety standard in the industry, and the safety of LiNiO2 has also been greatly improved. Only LiFePO4 shows higher safety performance, especially in electric vehicles. application in order to ensure its full competitive advantage in terms of security. The table below compares the performance of different Li-ion battery cathode materials.