Pore-scale modeling of battery and fuel cell performance

About the speaker

Dr. Jeff Gostick is an Associate Professor, Department of Chemical Engineering, at The University of Waterloo. Dr. Gostick leads the Porous Materials Engineering & Analysis Lab (PMEAL), and his group is the lead developer of OpenPNM and PoreSpy, two open-source software packages for studying porous materials at the pore-scale.

Webinar abstract

The presentation will outline the general approach for pore network modelling of the complex multiphysics involved in electrode reactions. Starting with the extraction of networks from tomograms (both traditional solid-void binary images as well as multiphase images of Li-ion cathodes consisting of void, active material, and binder), leading into the construction of accurate representations of the pore network structure, followed by a description of the mathematics of the physics being considered and discussion of some developments in implementing true multiphysics within the PNM framework.

The presentation will then introduce, via case studies, several of the recent accomplishments that his group have made using PNMs. Firstly, fuel cell catalyst layers result will be presented. This was conducted using networks obtained from pFIB-SEM serial sections, which produces images with 2nm voxel resolution. The incorporation of partitioning at the gas-ionomer interface and the role of ionomer thin films in ion conduction are both accessible within this model. Next, Dr. Gostick will discuss the application of PNMs to Li-ion cathodes. This work was done in collaboration with Electrochemical Innovation Lab at University College of London (UCL). Network models were extracted from 3-phase tomograms including void, active material, and the carbon binder phase, and validated against direct numerical simulation. Preliminary results will be shown highlighting the ability of PNMs to simulate transient discharge behavior in Li-ion.

Important Notices

• This event can be counted towards the seminar attendance milestone of University of Waterloo graduate students in the Department of Chemical Engineering. A link to register your attendance will be sent in the chat box during the event and will remain open for a short time only. Please note that you must attend the event from the beginning until its end to have your attendance counted.
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