Composite sulfur cathode for Li-S batteries comprising hierarchical carbon obtained from waste PET bottles

Abstract

Waste PET bottles have been processed towards carbonaceous material through pyrolysis at 500 °C in nitrogen atmosphere followed by chemical activation with K2CO3. The obtained carbon was found to feature hierarchical pore structure, as evidenced by nitrogen sorption isotherm analysis. Composite sulfur-carbon electrode has been prepared using this carbon by means of simple dry-mixing technique and subjected to electrochemical testing in model Li-S cells with electrolyte being 0.5 M lithium trifluoromethanesulfonate (LiTf) and 0.5 M lithium nitrate (LiNO3) in mixture of 1,2dimethoxyethane (DME) and 1,3-dioxolane (DOL). The Li-S cells assembled with obtained composite sulfur-carbon cathode demonstrated a large initial specific discharge capacity of about 829 mA h g−1 at 0.05 C current rate and delivered ca. 712 mA h g−1 after subsequent 50 charge and discharge cycles, which corresponds to 86% capacity retention. Generally, the investigated Li-S cells have exhibited good cycling stability and excellent reversibility. Thus, the obtained waste-derived activated porous carbon can be considered as a promising component for the composite cathode material of Li–S batteries.