Electrochemical impedance spectroscopy and cyclic voltammetry were used to investigate the electrode kinetics of V II -V III and V IV -V V in H 2 SO 4 on glassy carbon, carbon paper, carbon xerogel, and carbon fibers. It was shown that, for all carbon materials investigated, the kinetics of V II -V III is enhanced by anodic, and inhibited by cathodic, treatment of the electrode; in contrast, the kinetics of V IV -V V is inhibited by anodic, and enhanced by cathodic, treatment. The potential region for each of these effects varied only slightly with carbon material. Rate constants were always greater for V IV -V V than for V II -V III except when anodized electrodes were compared, which may explain discrepancies in the literature. The observed effects are attributed to oxygen-containing functional-groups on the electrode surface. The considerable differences between the potentials at which enhancement of V II -V III and inhibition of V IV -V V occur indicates that they do not correspond to a common oxidized state of the electrode. Likewise inhibition of V II -V III and enhancement of V IV -V V do not correspond to a common reduced state of the electrode. It is possible that enhancement of both V II -V III and V IV -V V is due to the same (active) state of the electrode. There is considerable interest in vanadium flow batteries (VFBs), also known as vanadium redox flow batteries (VRFBs or VRBs), for storage of electrical energy particularly in conjunction with renewable energy sources such as wind and solar. [1][2][3][4][5][6] Active areas of research include cell design and modelling, [7][8][9] performance and state-of-charge monitoring, 10-16 coulombic and energy efficiencies, 5,17,18 electrolytes, [11][12][13][14][15][16]19,20 membranes, 4,21 and electrodes. Cells typically have porous carbon electrodes and electrode performance can depend strongly on electrode treatment. Various electrochemical, 22-27,36-41 chemical, 36,40,43,44 and thermal [45][46][47][48][49] treatments have been reported. These treatments often have the effect of oxidizing or reducing the surface, and the influence of surface oxygen species on electrochemical kinetics at carbon electrodes is recognized, 22,57-60 although often not well understood. Thermal 45-49 and chemical 36,40,43,44 treatments of electrodes for VFBs have been tested on a range of carbon-based electrodes and, in general, these treatments result in higher activities of the electrode toward the vanadium redox reactions. There are also a number of reports of the effect of electrochemical treatment of electrodes. Anodic treatment of carbon felt was reported 22,36 to cause a decrease in the kinetic rates of the V IV -V V redox couple. In contrast, there are also reports of enhancement of V IV -V V kinetics after electrochemical oxidation [38][39][40][41] (of graphite and carbon felt electrodes) and of V II -V III kinetics after potential cycling 61 (of highly-oriented-pyrolytic-graphite and glassy carbon electrodes). However, in considering the effects of anodization on a c...