Professor Seo Jong-hwan's research team from the Department of Mechanical Engineering has successfully designed an eco-friendly material using bamboo for high-performance electrode materials and shortened the synthesis process for this material.

Among various energy storage and conversion devices, supercapacitors (SCs) have been currently appealing considerable attention due to their high power density, long lifespan, fast charge-discharge rate, low maintenance cost, and environmental friendliness. Along with batteries, the SCs play an important role in many energy storage and conversion systems. Designing high-performance electrode materials for SCs from renewable sources and facile synthesis strategies is of very great interest in the long-term development of sustainable economy, society, and environment

In this study, a bamboo-derived hierarchical porous carbon (BHPC) is directly prepared under air atmosphere via an eco-friendly, one-step, and easily-scalable salt-templating strategy using ZnCl₂/KCl salt mixture as a pore-directing solvent.

The obtained BHPC material exhibits a three-dimensional interconnected porous network with large specific surface area (1,296 m² g⁻¹) and large total pore volume (1.26 cm³ g⁻¹). Electrochemical performance evaluated in a three-electrode system indicates a high specific capacitance of 394 F g⁻¹ at 1 A g⁻¹ and a good rate capacity with 76.14% capacitance retention at 20 A g⁻¹. Also, the as-prepared symmetric supercapacitor delivers a high energy density of 11 Wh kg⁻¹ at a powder density of 126 W kg⁻¹, and an outstanding lifespan with 81% capacitance retention over 10,000 cycles. These results are superior to those of commercial active carbon and other biomass carbon-based symmetric SCs previously reported in the literature.

Importantly, the concept of preparing high-value electrode materials from a cheap and renewable carbon source is expected to offer a new opportunity for future studies on porous carbon materials for wide-range energy conversion and storage applications, such as zinc-ion hybrid capacitors, metal-air batteries, and Li-S batteries.

Related Journal: Nguyen, Tan Binh, et al. "A facile salt-templating synthesis route of bamboo-derived hierarchical porous carbon for supercapacitor applications."Carbon206 (2023): 383-391.

Figure. (a) Preparation of bamboo-derived hierarchical porous carbon (BHPC), (b, c, d) structural characterization of BHPC, and (e, f, g) electrochemical performance of symmetric supercapacitors based on BHPC electrode materials.