Abstract:
Energy generation from renewable energy assets is beneficial to overcome the energy crises. The
efficient development of electrochemical cell and electrochemical energy storage devices is crucial
for this purpose. In this research, the hydrothermal synthesis and modification of ZnO/CuO is
reported. ZnO-CuO is modified by adding various percentages of porous Ag that is synthesized by
Lindlar’s Frost method. Moreover, morphological modification of ZnO-CuO has also been
conducted along with the addition of carbon based multi walled carbon nanotubes and polyaniline
polymer to determine the energy storage application. The synthesized material was characterized
by XRD, Raman, SEM and EDX. The EC measurements indicate that ZnO/CuO-4 % Ag exhibited
highest methanol oxidation activity by indicating 642 mA/cm2 current density at 0.54 V vs
Ag/AgCl potential as compared to pristine composite ZnO/CuO (387 mA/cm2
vs Ag/AgCl). The
onset potential for MOR also decreased from 0.405 V of composite to 0.355 V in ZnO/CuO-4%
silver.
The composite ZnO/CuO (ZC2) synthesized by adding HMTA and urea indicated greater porosity
and surface area and hence the higher charge storage capacity. The specific capacitance is found
to be 644 F/g at 1A/g current density. Conducting polymer of aniline further modified the material
in ZC2-CNTs-PANI and indicated the Cs of 1411 F/g at 1 A/g CD. This hybrid composite was
stable and maintained the capacitive retention of 82.18 % and coloumbic efficiency of 99 %. This
indicated the successful modification of material for multiapplication
