Large-scale production of Li-ion cells exploiting natural cellulose binders and water-based papermaking technologies

It is evident that the necessity to find abundant, clean and cheap energy sources is one of the priorities of the twenty-first century. Nevertheless, the sources of sustainable energy disponible today are intermittent and/or restricted in specific areas; as a result, they require the use of suitable technologies for energy storage. The Li-based battery chemistry is well established, but still relatively young. Thus, several improvement can be made: optimization of existing chemistries by the introduction of environmentally friendly materials and the simplification of the device production process are intriguing challenges. Moreover, the recent developments in the next-generation electronic devices promoted the modification of the current systems towards lighter, more flexible and/or micro-sized ones. the research work I made during my Ph.D. was focused on the use of natural cellulose fibres for the production of innovative, low-cost and easily recyclable Li-ion cells by means of fast and reliable papermaking procedures exploiting water as solvent.