Pyrolysis of Corn Husk Enabled with Tin Oxide Nano Particles: Kinetic Studies and Biochar as Electrode Material

Abstract

Handling of agricultural residues is a major concern today, since they pose a serious threat to the environment. Pyrolysis is one among the different techniques explored across the globe towards the effective conversion of these crop residues into various useful products. In this work, the degradation behaviour of corn husk loaded with tin oxide nanoparticles and raw corn husk are characterized separately by employing thermogravimetric analyzer (TGA). From the thermograms obtained, the energy required for facilitating the degradation process with the aid of the catalyst is found to be 98.48 kJ/mol. Further, the corn husk loaded with prepared tin oxide nanoparticles (0.1 g& 0.2 g) is subjected to pyrolytic degradation at different temperature ranges from 400 °C to 550 °C and compared with thermal pyrolysis. The biochar retained from the pyrolysis process is investigated for its efficacy as an energy storage material after coating them over graphite sheet. Electrochemical analysis reveals the fabricated SnO2/biochar nanocomposite have excellent energy storage characteristics (205 F/g at a scan rate of 10 mV/s) which was attributed to the presence of facile architecture with porous surface area. The outcomes of the present study open fresh gateways for the innovative electrodes in energy domain.