Repurposing Rice Husk Biomass: Activated Porous Carbon for Electrode material of Supercapacitors with Enhanced Energy Storage/

Abstract

Supercapacitors are being progressively acknowledged as the ideal option for energy storage due to the fact that they have outstanding cycle stability, superior power density, the capacity to charge and discharge quickly, and operations that are not especially complicated. The use of supercapacitors has increased because of its ability to endure millions of charge cycles without experiencing significant degradation, which is not the case with batteries. They are the endurance athletes of the energy storage industry. Here in the study the synthesis of distinct carbon electrode materials, including basic carbons and highly porous carbon, from bio-waste using carbonization, hydrothermal acidolysis, and template-assisted carbonization. The SEM analysis revealed that the carbon to activated porous carbon activation process successfully created a high concentration of voids and rough surface in the carbon matrix, indicating a combined enhancement in surface area. The BET results verified that the materials have a mesoporous structure among them the activated porous carbon material showed micro along with mesopores, because of this, it has a large surface area and pore volume, both of which have the potential to improve its performance. The activated porous carbon electrode material exhibited significant capacitive activity, while maintaining a current density of 1 A g-1 , the specific capacitance of 1640 F g-1 was achieved. The cyclic stability of the activated porous carbon material was extremely excellent, as evidenced by the fact that it retained 99.6% of its capacitance even after being subjected to 15,000 cycles. This clearly shows the improved structural integrity and the existence of numerous highly permeable and reactive areas within the material. These significant capabilities make our material superior to previously documented carbon materials derived from biowaste carbon precursors.