The conversion of biomass into carbon electrode material using FeCl3 as an activating agent for battery application

Abstract

Batteries and supercapacitors are one of the energy storage devices that had been used for a practical application most electronic devices such as mobile phone. The development of these energy storage devices is faced by the poor performance of (the) electrode. Electrode commonly used for batteries and supercapacitors is derived from nonrenewable carbon resources such as graphite. However, the availability of this material is becoming a long-term problem for the development of batteries and supercapacitors. Biomass from (the) waste plant as a green source for battery electrode is one of alternative carbon which has great potential, due to the low price, easy to process and has high stability. This paper reports the study of the biomass conversion into carbon electrode material having high electrical conductivity or low electrical resistivity using carbonization and pyrolysis process. The process involved FeCl3 as an activating agent to reduce the electrical resistivity of the material as low as possible. The research was studying the effect of biomass sources and the processing method on the electrical resistivity of the electrode produced. The biomasses used in the study were corncob, water hyacinth, rice straw, and coconut husk. The material is the waste plant which is available in abundant. The morphological analysis of the carbon surface was conducted using Scanning Electron Microscope-Energy Dispersive X-Ray (SEM-EDX). The lowest electrical resistivity was produced from corncob material through the carbonization process at 300°C for 2 h, activated by 4 M FeCl3 solution and followed by pyrolysis process at 800°C for 6 h. The FeCl3 is suspected responsible for the decreasing of the carbon resistivity or increasing the electrical conductivity produced, this correlates with the increase of the surface area of the material. The lowest electrical resistivity (highest electrical conductivity) produced from corncob has a value of 1 Ω with the surface area of 601 m2/g. This is considered better than graphite in term of electrical resistivity in which graphite has electrical resistivity between 10 - 30 Ω. The result of SEM images shows that the carbon surface activated by FeCl3 has more pores compared to the carbon without activation.