Waste bio-tar based N-doped porous carbon for supercapacitors under dual activation: performance, mechanism, and assessment
Jixiu Jia, Yuxuan Sun, Zhidan Liu, Ziyun Liu, Lili Huo, Kang Kang, Yanan Zhao, Lixin Zhao, Teng Xie, Maojiong Cao, Zonglu Yao
Abstract
Abstract Bio-tar extra-produced from biomass pyrolysis is prone to pose a threat to environment and human health. A novel N-doped porous electrode from bio-tar was produced under dual-activation of urea and KOH in this study. One-pot dual-activation played significant roles in N-functional group and micro-mesoporous structure, which resulted in the carbon material with the highest of nitrogen content (4.08%) and the special surface area (1298.26 m 2 ·g −1 ). Specifically, the potential mechanisms of pore formation and N-doping in the one-pot dual-activation strategy were also proposed as a consequence, the one-pot dual-activated carbon material displayed excellent electrochemical performance with the highest capacitance of 309.5 F·g −1 at 0.5 A·g −1 , and the unipolar specific capacitance remained with cyclic characteristics of 80.1% after 10,000 cycles in two-electrode symmetric system. Furthermore, the one-pot dual-activation strategy could create a profit of $1.64–$2.38 per kilogram of bio-tar processed without considering the initial investment and labor costs, which provides new perspectives for the utilization of waste bio-tar. Graphical Abstract