Sn-Improving Flexible Carbon Electrode from Electrospun Nanofibers for a High-Performance Supercapacitor

Abstract

Direct construction of the electrode meets the requirement of quick development of energy storage technology, especially those support-free electrodes consisting of 100% activated materials. Herein, a support-free carbon electrode is prepared using the electrospinning method and the following carbonization process, which owns an improved flexibility of rolling and folding when the ductile Sn component is introduced in the polymer solution of electrospinning. Moreover, the above carbon electrode is composed of one-dimensional (1D) nanosized carbon fiber (ϕ ∼ 366 nm). Furthermore, the specific surface area of the carbon-fiber-based electrode reaches 1423.96 m2 g–1 after chemical activation, and thus, this electrode exhibits excellent electrochemical supercapacitor performance for a single electrode (specific capacitance of 342.05 F g–1 at the current density of 0.5 A g–1) and its symmetric supercapacitor (energy density of 15.26 Wh kg–1 at the power density of 187.5 W kg–1).