A new approach for coupled modelling of the structural and thermo-physical properties of molten salts. Case of a polymeric liquid LiF-BeF₂

The (Li,Be)F_x fluoride salt is an ionic liquid with complex non-ideal thermodynamic behaviour due to the formation of short-range order. In this work, we explore the relationship between local structure, thermo-physical and thermodynamic properties in this system using a multidisciplinary approach that couples molecular dynamics simulations using the Polarizable Ion Model (PIM) and thermodynamic modelling assessment using the CALPHAD method. The density, thermal expansion, viscosity, thermal conductivity, molar and mixing enthalpies and heat capacity of the (Li,Be)F_x melt are extracted from the polarizable ionic interaction potentials and investigated across a wide range of compositions and temperatures. The agreement with the available experimental data is generally very good. The local structure is also examined in detail, in particular the transition between a molecular liquid with Li⁺, BeF₄ ²⁻ and F⁻ predominant species at low BeF₂ content, and a polymeric liquid at high BeF₂ content, with the formation of polymers (Be₂F₇ ³⁻, Be₃F₁₀ ⁴⁻, Be₄F₁₃ ⁵⁻, etc.), and finally of a three-dimensional network of corner-sharing tetrahedrally coordinated Be²⁺ cations for pure BeF₂. Based on the available experimental information and the output of the MD simulations, we moreover develop for the first time a coupled structural-thermodynamic model for the LiF-BeF₂ system based on the quasi-chemical formalism in the quadruplet approximation, that provides a physical description of the melt and reproduces (in addition to the thermodynamic data) the chemical speciation of beryllium polymeric species predicted from the simulations.