The magnesium-air (Mg-air) battery is a promising candidate for energy storage technology as it is environmentally friendly, affordable, and safe, further possessing high energy density and theoretical specific capacity. To understand the electrochemical behaviour of these relatively unreported battery systems, three distinct goals were defined in this research: shedding light on their discharge-recharge performance, analysing discharge products, and exploring techniques to improve their efficiency. Different batteries were tested under various current densities to compare and assess the performance. Advance analytical methods were also applied to characterise the products formed after discharge step. Additionally, to lower the high overpotential that is often caused by the sluggish kinetics of the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR), a catalyst was used. The outcome showed that the Mg-air batteries continuously experience the problems, such as high overpotential, by-product formation and the presence of MgO residues during recharge, all of which restrict their performance. To better use these batteries in practical and real-world applications, further research should be done to tackle these challenges.
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