Distinguished Roles of Nitrogen-Doped Sp2 and Sp3 Hybridized Carbon on Extraordinary Supercapacitance in Acidic Aqueous Electrolyte.

Abstract

The acidic aqueous supercapacitors have been found to deliver appealing capacitive properties due to fast ion diffusion caused by the applied smallest size of hydrion. However, their practical applications are largely inhibited by the narrow electrochemical stability window of water (1.23V). Herein, A nitrogen-enriched porous carbon materials (RNOPCs) is reported, consisting of varied nitrogen doping bonded on sp2 and sp3 carbon sites, which are capable of stimulating a wider potential window up to 1.4V and thus resulting in a great enhancement of capacitive performance in aqueous acidic electrolytes. Together with the improved electrical conductivity and preferable hydrion diffusion, RNOPCs exhibit an ultrahigh volumetric capacitance (1084 F cm-3) in 0.5M H2SO4. Besides, a fully packed RNOPCs-based symmetrical supercapacitor can deliver a high gravimetric and volumetric energy density of 31.8Wh Kg-1 and 54.3Wh L-1 respectively, approaching those of lead acid batteries (25-35Wh Kg-1). The first-principles calculations reveal that the lone pair electrons of the doped nitrogen can be delocalized on its neighboring carbon atoms, improving charge uptakes and overpotentials. Such facile and scale-up production of carbon-based supercapacitors can bridge the gap of energy density between traditional supercapacitors and batteries in aqueous electrolytes.