Simple and Cost-Effective Synthesis of Activated Carbon Anchored by Functionalized Multiwalled Carbon Nanotubes for High-Performance Supercapacitor Electrodes with High Energy Density and Power Density

Abstract

We prepared a composite using activated carbon and functionalised multiwalled carbon nanotubes by a simple and cost-effective process and investigated its use for supercapacitor application. The electrochemical performance of the prepared composite has been investigated by galvanostatic charge-discharge (GCD) and cyclic voltammetry (CV) measurements in a three-electrode set-up. The composite resulted in maximum specific capacitance of 395 F/g at 5 mV/s as measured by CV, and of 372 F/g at 60 A/g by GCD measurement in 3M KOH aqueous electrolyte. High power and energy density of 75.27 kW/kg and 25.31 WAEh/kg at 60 A/g have been respectively obtained for composite using GCD measurement. The long-term charge-discharge stability has been performed for the composite electrodes, and it is observed that 89% of capacitance is retained even after 5000 cycles. The achieved results suggest that the prepared activated carbon/multiwalled carbon nanotube composite can be a potential electrode material in high-performance supercapacitors for energy storage applications.

Supercapacitors: An Efficient Way for Energy Storage Application

“…Figure 12 shows the setup of electrochemical measurements and CV curves of the synthesized materials with different configurations and at different scan rates. Mandal et al [103] prepared a carbon-based composite electrode using activated carbon and functionalized multi-walled carbon nanotubes. In a 3M KOH electrolyte, the electrode exhibited a maximum capacity of 395 F /g (at 5 mV/s), and 372 F/g (at 60 A/g) with a capacity retention of 89% after 5000 cycles.…”

Properties of Carbon Fibers as Supercapacitor Electrodes via Electrospinning Using a Blending Solution of Polyacrylonitrile and Bisphenol A

“…PCs mostly exhibit higher capacitance than EDLCs but have the disadvantages of low cycle stability and large internal resistance due to metal oxide electrodes [14][15][16]. On the other hand, EDLCs mainly use carbon materials such as carbon nanotubes [17][18][19], graphene [20][21][22], activated carbon [23][24][25], and carbon nanofibers [26][27][28][29], and are attracting attention as a promising energy storage device due to their advantages such as high energy efficiency, excellent cycle stability, nontoxicity of the material, and low cost [30,31] (Table 1).…”