Flow batteries are attractive for storing wind and solar power on the grid because they can be scaled cheaply, but zinc-bromine designs have long been hobbled by the corrosive free bromine they generate, which shortens their working life. In a study published in Nature Energy, researchers at the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics report adding sodium sulfamate to the electrolyte as a bromine scavenger. It rapidly captures free bromine as a milder brominated compound and enables an extra electron-transfer reaction, which the team says raised energy density to about 152 watt-hours per litre versus 90 for a conventional cell, while extending cycle life from roughly 30 cycles to more than 600. The chemistry is a peer-reviewed lab-scale result; whether it holds up at true grid scale, over years of operation, and at acceptable cost still has to be demonstrated before any practical deployment.^[1]

Source

1. Xu, Y. et al. Grid-scale corrosion-free Zn/Br flow batteries enabled by a multi-electron transfer reaction. Nature Energy. 2025. doi:10.1038/s41560-025-01907-5