Review identifies design challenges and failure pathways in electrochemical energy storage technologies, suggesting strategies for improvement.
Achieving the grand vision of global carbon neutrality requires synergistic breakthroughs in the energy density, cycle life, and intrinsic safety of electrochemical energy storage technologies. However, beneath the ideal performance of any single material lie intrinsic, insurmountable trade-offs fundamentally dictated by thermodynamics and kinetics. This review constructs a designmodelingfailureengineering closed-loop cognitive framework to systematicallyrather than in a fragmented mannerexamine advanced energy storage systems. First, covering high-nickel cathodes, alloy anodes, and solid-state electrolytes, we elucidate core design philosophies and inherent performance limitations, revealing the intrinsic contradiction between high specific energy and high safety. Second, we explicitly position multi-scale theoretical modeling as a digital microscope for deciphering microscopic mechanisms, detailing how tools ranging from density functional theory (DFT) electronic structure analysis to phase-field mechanical simulations explain and predict potential failure pathways in ideal designs, and critically examining their applicability boundaries. Furthermore, focusing on the discrepancy between ideal and reality, we comprehensively map the multi-mechanism coupled degradation spectrum, spanning structuralchemical collapse, mechano-electrochemical-coupled failure, interfacial reaction runaway, and system-level thermal accumulation. Finally, we ground the discussion in engineering practice, demonstrating the process logic from gram-scale to gigawatt-hour mass production, exploring a degradation-tolerant operation strategy informed by failure cognition, and outlining a recycling landscape geared toward a full-life-cycle closed loop. This review aims to provide researchers with a systematic cognitive framework that transcends mere material cataloging, advancing the rational design and engineering implementation of high-safety energy storage technologies.
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Wang et al. (2026) studied this question.
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