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Double-activated porous carbons for high-performance supercapacitor electrodes

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Abstract

The double-activated porous carbons (DAPCs) with unique bimodal pore structure were prepared by activating commercial microporous carbon (CMCs) twice through KOH (double activation) at high temperature. The as-prepared DAPCs show larger surface area (833 m2·g−1), and the pores are composed of micropores (size of ~1.8 nm) and mesopores (size of ~4.5 nm). Such special hierarchical porous structures integrate the dual advantages of micropore and mesopore, having not only the high energy storage of the micropores but also the high-rate performance of the mesopores for supercapacitors (SCs). As a result, the optimized DAPCs-3-1 exhibits a high specific capacitance of 277 F·g−1 at 1 A·g−1, enhanced rate performance of 197 F·g−1 at a high current density of 10 A·g−1, and excellent cycling stability with 94.2% capacity retention after 10,000 cycles in the 1 mol·L−1 Na2SO4 electrolyte. The facile double activation could be a promising method to prepare suitable porous carbons with exceptional electrochemical properties for SCs.

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Acknowledgments

This work was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 51472110), Shandong Provincial Natural Science Foundation (No. ZR2016EMB05), University of Jinan Science Foundation (No. XKY1630), and a Research Project from Ministry of Education, China (No. 213021A).

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  1. Materials Center for Energy and Photoelectrochemical Conversion, School of Material Science and Engineering, University of Jinan, Jinan, 250022, China

    Jing Sun, Shu-Hua Yang, Shan-Shan Li & Bing-Qiang Cao

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  1. Jing Sun
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  2. Shu-Hua Yang
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Correspondence to Bing-Qiang Cao.

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Sun, J., Yang, SH., Li, SS. et al. Double-activated porous carbons for high-performance supercapacitor electrodes. Rare Met. 36, 449–456 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12598-017-0896-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12598-017-0896-7

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