Thin aerogel materials

A battery comprising an aerogel material produced by a method comprising:

• (a) providing a casting surface and a casting frame, wherein an inner boundary of the casting frame encloses a casting area on the casting surface;
• (b) providing a sol-gel solution;
• (c) placing a fiberglass-based reinforcement material into the casting area;
• (d) combining the sol-gel solution with the reinforcement material in the casting area;
• (e) applying pressure to the sol-gel solution to promote spreading of the sol-gel solution through the reinforcement material in the casting area until a thickness of the sol-gel solution is the same as the thickness of the casting frame;
• (f) allowing the sol-gel solution to transition into a gel material, thereby forming a reinforced gel composition;
• and
• (g) drying the reinforced gel composition to produce a reinforced aerogel composition, wherein the resulting reinforced aerogel composition has an average thickness of less than 10 mm and a thickness variation of less than 15%.