Electrochemical Stability of Metal Electrodes for Reversible Magnesium Deposition/Dissolution in Tetrahydrofuran Dissolving Ethylmagnesium Chloride

There is an urgent need for low-cost and electrochemically stable conductive materials for use as current collectors in the development of commercial magnesium batteries, positive/negative electrode materials, and electrolytes with wide potential windows. In this work, we studied the stability of common metallic electrodes aluminum, copper, and austenitic stainless steel for reversible magnesium deposition/dissolution in tetrahydrofuran using ethylmagnesium chloride and aluminum chloride. The different electrodes used changed both the overpotential of magnesium deposition and the reversibility of Mg deposition/dissolution. Among the metals, copper electrodes gave the lowest overpotential for Mg deposition and high cycling efficiency of Mg deposition/dissolution, larger than 97%. (c) 2012 The Electrochemical Society. All rights reserved.