Various Treated Conditions to Prepare Porous Activated Carbon Fiber for Application in Supercapacitor Electrodes

Abstract

Porous activated carbon fiber (ACF) is prepared from oxidized polyacrylonitrile (PAN) fiber through three activation methods, which are traditional chemical activation, traditional physical activation, and ameliorative chemical activation. The samples under various high temperature heat treatments are used as electrode for the supercapacitor. The structure and electrochemical properties of these samples are then characterized by nitrogen adsorption at 77 K, X-ray diffraction (XRD), Raman spectrum, electron spectroscopy for chemical analysis (ECSA), Fourier transform infrared spectrometer (FTIR), cyclic voltammetry (CV), and galvanotactic charge/discharge, respectively. Once formed by the ameliorative chemical activation method, which is used for the electrodes of supercapacitors, the samples exhibited excellent capacitance characteristics in the 1 M H 2 SO 4 electrolyte and showed a high specific capacitance of 158 F/g, which is higher than the two traditional activation methods. HP20-1/3-900 presents a high specific capacitance of 173 F/g in 1 M H 2 SO 4 electrolyte and a high discharge capacitance of 180 F/g. Moreover, HP20-1/3-900 has near triangular shapes, reflecting their excellent charge/discharge capacitive performance. Results of this study demonstrate that the ameliorative activation process for preparing makes this activated carbon fiber a highly promising electrode material for industrial applications of supercapacitors.

A universal equivalent circuit for carbon-based supercapacitors

“…For this reason, carbon has become the material of choice for many commercial supercapacitors. Among the types of carbon that have been studied in detail are activated carbon (the industry standard) [6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13], various templated carbons [14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23], carbon black [24][25][26][27], carbon aerogel [28][29][30][31][32], carbon nanotubes [33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41][42][43][44][45][46], and graphene [47][48][49][50][51][52][53][54][55]…”

Effect of activation on the carbon fibers from phenol–formaldehyde resins for electrochemical supercapacitors

“…Figure 5a shows the cyclic voltammograms obtained for the CF, the CO 2 -, and KOHtreated materials in 6 mol L -1 KOH. The activated carbon fibers from phenol-formaldehyde resins present no anodic current at high potential and a broader potential range from -1 to 0.2 V in aqueous electrolytes, which is broader than those carbon fibers obtained from Nomex [18] and polacrylonitrile [4,19]. All samples exhibited nearly rectangular-type I-V curves with steep increment in current at the potentials of -1.0 to -0.9 V and this represents the ideal behavior of supercapacitor [1].…”

“…[1]. Basically, chemical and physical activation of ACFs allow producing materials with certain surface area and pore size distribution [4][5][6][7]. In the case of physical activation (H 2 O, CO 2 , air, etc.…”

Development of fibroblast culture in three-dimensional activated carbon fiber-based scaffold for wound healing

“…However, traditional carbon fibers are not porous or have a large surface area. Therefore, various methods can be used to prepare activated carbon fibers with many pores and a large surface area, including chemical activation, physical activation, and a combination of these two activation processes [14,15]. The activated carbon fiber has high adsorption and catalysis capacity.…”