Supercapacitors have been fabricated from reduced graphene oxide (rGO) based on coconut shell. The production of rGO was started from carbonizing coconut shell at 100 – 140°C of temperature, then sieving of 200 mesh and calcinating at 400°C for 5 hours. The peaks of XRD pattern had indicated rGO phase. Supercapacitor electrodes were fabricated from two different sources of nitrogen for doping. Firstly, the electrode was fabricated from the mixing of the rGO coconut shell, HCl, glucose, FeCl3 bubbled with nitrogen gas (N2). Secondly, it was fabricated from the same starting materials; however, the nitrogen was from the ammonium hydroxide (NH4OH). Cyclic voltammetric characterization indicates that nitrogen atom originating from NH4OH has been more effective to be inserted in rGO for increasing the capacitance of the fabricated supercapacitors.

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An understanding on roles of excitons and plasmons is important in excitonic solar cells and photovoltaic (PV) technologies. Here, we produce new amorphous carbon (a-C) like films on Indium Tin Oxide (ITO) generating PV cells with efficiency three order of magnitude higher than the existing biomass-derived a-C. The amorphous carbon films are prepared from the bioproduct of palmyra sap with a simple, environmentally friendly, and highly reproducible method. Using spectroscopic ellipsometry, we measure simultaneously complex dielectric function, loss function as well as reflectivity and reveal coexistence of many-body resonant excitons and correlated-plasmons occurring due to strong electronic correlations. X-ray absorption and photoemission spectroscopies show the nature of electron and hole in defining the energy of the excitons and plasmons as a function of N or B doping. Our result shows new a-C like films and the importance of the coupling of resonant excitons and correlated plasmons in determining efficiency of photovoltaic devices.

Amorphous carbon films have been explored and used in a wide variety of applications. With the n-type and p-type amorphous carbon film, it can be used to make p-n junctions for solar cells. This research aims to study the structure of boron- and nitrogen-doped amorphous carbon (a-C:B and a-C:N) films. This research uses the basic material of bio-product from palmyra sugar to form amorphous carbon. Amorphous carbon was synthesized by heating the palmyra sugar at 250°C. The results of XRD showed that the doped films produce an amorphous carbon phase. PES was used to analyze the bonding state of dopants in the sample. B4C, BC3, and BC2O bonds formed in a-C:B, while pyridine and pyrrolic formed in a-C:N.

Rice straw waste in Indonesia is abundant and not yet used optimally. The composition of rice straw is 40% cellulose, 30% hemicellulose, 15% silica and 15% lignin so it is potentially to be a raw material of active carbon and supercapasitor electrode. Many efforts has been done to increase the value of capacitance of electrode like increase the surface area with activation and milling process. In this research used the variation of activator substance and the variation of milling velocity, they are H3PO4 450 rpm, H3PO4 600 rpm, and KOH 450 rpm. The purposes of this research are identify and characterize the rice straw charcoal material as nanocarbon and also knowing the nanocarbon quality of rice straw charcoal material as supercapacitor electrode. The methods are carbonization, activation, and solid state reaction. The result of this research shows the value of capacitance at H3PO4 450 rpm, H3PO4 600 rpm, and KOH 450 rpm are 28,96 F/g; 30,89 F/g; dan 19,31 F/g. From this research, we can conclude that activator substance and milling velocity affect the value of capacitance that is produced. The result of SEM-EDX test is comparable with the result of cyclic voltammetry test, the higher number of pores the higher value of capacitances produced.