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Highly porous nitrogen-doped seaweed carbon for high-performance lithium–sulfur batteries

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Abstract

Due to its natural abundance, low cost and environmental sustainability, carbon derived from biomass has been widely utilized for energy storage and conversion. Herein, we report a facile strategy to synthesize a hierarchically porous carbon via the pyrolysis of seaweed biomass under inert atmosphere and apply it as a cathode material in lithium–sulfur (Li-S) batteries for the first time. Systematic materials characterization suggests that the seaweed carbon (SWC) is doped with N and displays micro-, meso- and macroporous structures and possesses a high total pore volume of 1.48 cm3 g−1 and a high surface area of 1510.71 m2 g−1, which is beneficial for encapsulating a large amount of sulfur. The as-obtained SWC-S composite, containing 65.7 wt% sulfur content, delivered a high initial discharge capacity of 1221.2 mAh g−1 and retained a capacity of 826.4 mAh g−1 after 70 cycles at 0.2 C. Additionally, the SWC-S composite produced a reversible capacity of 540.6 mAh g−1 after 300 cycles at high rate of 1 C. Compared to the pure sulfur cathode, the SWC-S cathode displays excellent rate capabilities, low polarization and good reaction kinetics, highlighting that this biomass-derived porous carbon is suitable for assembling high-performance Li-S batteries.

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Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge the financial support of the ARC Discovery Grants from the Australian Research Council, National Natural Science Foundation of China (31601415), Natural Science Foundation of Guangdong (2015A030313893, 2016A030307022), Lingnan Normal University Natural Science Foundation (LZL1505) and Zhanjiang Special Competitive Allocation of Financial Capital Project (2015A02028).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Clean Environment and Energy, Environmental Futures Research Institute, Griffith School of Environment, Griffith University, Gold Coast Campus, Southport, QLD, 4222, Australia

    Luke Hencz, Xingxing Gu, Xiaosong Zhou & Shanqing Zhang

  2. College of Environment and Resources, Chongqing Technology and Business University, Chongqing, 400067, China

    Xingxing Gu

  3. Science and Engineering Faculty, Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, QLD, 4001, Australia

    Wayde Martens

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  1. Luke Hencz
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  2. Xingxing Gu
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  3. Xiaosong Zhou
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  4. Wayde Martens
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  5. Shanqing Zhang
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Correspondence to Xingxing Gu or Shanqing Zhang.

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Hencz, L., Gu, X., Zhou, X. et al. Highly porous nitrogen-doped seaweed carbon for high-performance lithium–sulfur batteries. J Mater Sci 52, 12336–12347 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10853-017-1288-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10853-017-1288-y

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