Efficient energy transport from triboelectric nanogenerators to lithium-ion batteries via releasing electrostatic energy instantaneously

•An excellent strategy to cope with the connection between energy conversion and storage devices.•A method to obtain maximum energy output of TENG.•An energy transport system combination to satisfy the need of the today’s energy power unit.•Providing opportunities for joint multidisciplinary development to exploiting distributed power unit. Triboelectric nanogenerators (TENGs) and lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) play an important role in the field of clean energy as energy conversion and storage devices respectively. It is vital to fabricate efficient transport between TENGs and LIBs for promoting the development in combined energy systems. This work constructs an efficient energy transport system between the contact-energy contact-separation TENG (CCS-TENG) and the LIB by introducing power management based on a short-circuit contact in-situ. Such synergy system satisfies the needs of improving the efficient connection between TENGs and LIBs, durability and miniaturization of energy unit. The short-circuit contact in-situ guarantees the maximum energy output of CSS-TENG in every contact-separation cycle and the energy density is as high as 131.1 mJ m−2 cycle−1, although the electrode of CCS-TENG is only 10 cm2. Moreover, the TENG cycle has exceeded 1.3 million cycles without attenuation with the help of charge injection. This approach enables an efficient energy transport from environmental mechanical energy to electricity and then to chemical energy, and constructs an efficient energy transport bridge for TENGs and LIBs, thereby providing important insights into the dynamics of charge transfer and their complex interrelations between TENGs and LIBs.