Abstract
Carbon nanofibers consisting of Poly(acrylonitrile) (PAN) and enzymatic hydrolysis lignin (EHL) were prepared in the present study by electrospinning followed by stabilization in air and carbonization in N2 environment. The morphology and structure of the electrospun carbon nanofibers were characterized by Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM), Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET), Roman, and the electrochemical performances were then evaluated by cyclic voltammetry (CV), galvanostatic charge-discharge (GCD), and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS)methods. When the amount of EHL was 60 wt. %, the as-prepared nanofibers have the smallest average diameter of 172 nm and the largest BET specific surface area of 675 m2/g without activating treatment. The carbon nanofiber electrode showed excellent specific capacitance of 216.8 F/g at the current density of 1 A/g, maintaining 88.8% capacitance retention after 2000 cycles. Moreover, the carbon nanofiber electrode containing 60 wt. % exhibited a smaller time constant (0.5 s) in comparison to that of carbon nanofibers in literatures. These findings suggest the potential use of EHL could be a practical as a sustainable alternative for PAN in carbon electrode manufacturing.
Highlights
With increasingly scarce of fossil fuels, the development of new sustainable energy storage device is necessary, such as Li-ion batteries, fuel cells, solar cells, and supercapacitors
The supercapacitors can be classified into electrochemical double-layer capacitors (EDLCs) and pseudocapacitors [3,4] according to their energy storage mechanism
Further increased in the enzymatic hydrolysis lignin (EHL) content to 70 wt. % resulted in a dramatic change in nanofiber morphology, where the diameter of nanofiber became heterogeneous and nanofiber skeleton was filled with abundant beads (Figure 2d)
Summary
With increasingly scarce of fossil fuels, the development of new sustainable energy storage device is necessary, such as Li-ion batteries, fuel cells, solar cells, and supercapacitors. The electrode materials of supercapacitors are of three types, which are carbon-based materials [7,8], conducting polymers [9,10,11], and transition metal oxides [12,13,14]. Polyacrylonitrile (PAN) is the most common-used polymer precursor for preparation of carbon nanofibers through electrospinning and thereafter stabilization and carbonization processes. Despite the carbon nanofibers from PAN have superior properties such as high mechanical strength and surface area, the use of petroleum-based. To the best of our knowledge, there is no research to fabricate carbon nanofibers used EHL as a precursor.In the present study, we evaluated the use of EHL as a polymer blend for the preparation of carbon nanofibers through an electrospinning technique and followed by stabilization and carbonization. The electrochemical performances of carbon nanofiber membranes were further studied by cyclic voltammetry (CV), galvanostatic charge/discharge, and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS)
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