Investigating effectiveness of activated carbons of natural sources on various supercapacitors
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Activated carbon can be produced from natural sources, such as pistachio and acorn shells, which can be an inexpensive and sustainable sources of natural wastes for the energy storage devices, such as supercapacitors. The carbonaceous materials used in this study were carbonized at the temperatures of 700 degrees C and 900 degrees C after the stabilization process at 240 degrees C for two hours. These shells showed approximately 60% carbon yield. Carbonized nutshells were chemically activated using1wt% potassium hydroxide (KOH). Activated carbon powders with polyvinylidene fluoride (PVdF) were used to construct carbon electrodes. A 1M of tetraethylammonium tetrafluoroborate (TEABF(4)) and propylene carbonate (PC) were used as electrolytes. Electrochemical techniques, such as cyclic voltammetry (CV) and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) were used for the characterization of the supercapacitors. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) was used to inspect the surface texture of the activated carbons. Activated pistachio shells carbonized at 700 degrees C showed more porous surface texture than those carbonized at 900 degrees C. Effects of the carbonization temperatures were studied for their electrochemical characteristics. The shells carbonized at 700 degrees C showed better electrochemical characteristics compared to those carbonized at 900 degrees C. The test results provided about 27,083 mu F/g specific capacitance at a scan rate of 10mV/s. This study showed promising results for using these activated carbons produced from the natural wastes for supercapacitor applications.