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Facile synthesis of nitrogen-doped porous carbons for CO2 capture and supercapacitors

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Abstract

Nitrogen-doped porous carbons are attracting considerable attention as adsorbents in CO2 uptake area or for supercapacitors. In this work, nitrogen-doped porous carbons with a high surface area are efficiently prepared through a facile approach by using polyvinylpyrrolidone as carbon and nitrogen sources through ZnCl2 activation at 400–700 °C for 4 h under N2 atmosphere. The obtained nitrogen-doped porous carbons exhibit a narrow microporous structure (0.4–1.0 nm), high specific surface area (up to 1040 m2 g−1) and corresponding N content of up to 6.3 wt%. These findings are ascribed to the unique features of high specific surface area and rich N content. Such nitrogen-doped porous carbons show high CO2 capture of 4.0 mmol g−1 (0 °C) and 2.5 mmol g−1 (25 °C), as well as excellent capacitive performance with a specific capacitance of 292 F g−1 (in 2 M KOH) at a current density of 0.5 A g−1 and cycling stability. A symmetrical supercapacitor based on NPCs shows high energy density (23.2 W h kg−1 at 0.5 A g−1) and good cycle stability (96.8% capacitance retention after 5000 cycles) in symmetric two-electrode systems.

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Acknowledgements

This project was supported by the Shanghai Leading Academic Discipline Project (Project No. J51503), National Natural Science Foundation of China (Project Nos. 20976105, 51641208 and 21606151), Shanghai excellent technical leaders (Project No. 17XD1424900), Shanghai Association for Science and Technology Achievements Transformation Alliance Program (Project No. LM201559), Shanghai Municipal Education Commission boosting project (Project No. 15cxy39), Science and Technology Commission of Shanghai Municipality Project (Project No. 14520503200), Shanghai Municipal Education Commission (Plateau Discipline Construction Program), Shanghai Talent Development Funding (Project No. 201335).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, Shanghai Institute of Technology, Haiquan Road 100, 201418, Shanghai, People’s Republic of China

    Huanming Wei, Wei Qian, Ning Fu, HaiJun Chen, Jinbao Liu, Xinze Jiang, Guoxian Lan, Hualin Lin & Sheng Han

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  1. Huanming Wei
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  2. Wei Qian
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  3. Ning Fu
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Correspondence to Hualin Lin or Sheng Han.

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Wei, H., Qian, W., Fu, N. et al. Facile synthesis of nitrogen-doped porous carbons for CO2 capture and supercapacitors. J Mater Sci 52, 10308–10320 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10853-017-1087-5

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