Physical and Chemical Properties of Poly(ethylene)oxide Ternary Solid Polymer Electrolytes Based on Ni/Al Layered Double Hydroxide

In this work, a solid polymer electrolyte (SPE) was synthesized by solution casting technique using poly(ethylene oxide) (PEO) as polymer host doped with lithium trifluoromethanesulfonate (LiCF3SO3) and Ni/Al layered double hydroxide (Ni/Al LDH) as filler. Subsequently, Ni/Al LDH were introduced into the polymer electrolyte and characterized by electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) to determine the composition of additive, which gives the highest conductivity for each system. At ambient temperature, the highest conductivity is obtained for the composition PEO–5 wt.% Ni/Al LDH–8 wt.% LiCF3SO3 with a value 8 × 10–6 S cm–1. X-ray diffraction (XRD) studies indicate that the conductivity increase is due to an increase in amorphous content which enhances the segmental flexibility of polymeric chains and the disordered structure of the electrolyte. For composites, the characteristic peaks of Ni/Al LDH disappeared irrespective of filler content. The presence of complexation and interaction among the components was demonstrated by FTIR spectra, while images captured by FESEM revealed the morphological changes in the solid polymer electrolyte.