Facile synthesis of hierarchically porous carbon monolith without templating agent for various applications in energy and catalysis

Abstract

Monolithic carbon with hierarchically porous structure has a promising prospect for a wide range of applications in the fields of energy, environment, catalysis, etc. Due to the reliance on the utilization of templating agents, conventional preparation approaches often suffer from time-consuming preparation, complex post-processing, and uneconomical cost. Herein, we develop a novel strategy to match the sol-gel transition with the phase separation process for the direct preparation of hierarchically porous carbon monolith (HPCM) without templating agent. Resorcinol and resol are employed as carbon sources to adjust the polymerization for the formation of bi-continuous microstructure. Well-defined hierarchical pores and large specific surface area for fast mass diffusion enable the HPCM to be a prospective kind of electrode material in supercapacitor with an outstanding specific capacitance over 350 F g−1 (1.0 A g−1). After facile sulfonation, the modified HPCM can act as solid acid catalyst to realize a high-performance production of 5-hydroxymethylfurfural (5-HMF) in a 90 % yield with turnover frequency (TOF) value up to 155.9 h−1. Additionally, HPCM also exhibits an excellent Joule heating effect, which can be applied to the thermal management after compounding with phase change materials. The desirable integrated performance enables HPCM to be a valuable material suitable for various applications.