Preparation of activated carbon from bamboo-cellulose fiber and its use for EDLC electrode material

Carbonization and post activation of bamboo-cellulose fiber was carried out. The carbonization was performed at 600 °C, 800 °C and 1000 °C in argon atmosphere. Then, they were activated by heating solid mixture of carbonized bamboo and sodium hydroxide (NaOH) at 720 °C in argon atmosphere. The largest specific surface area of the resulting activated carbon (carbonized at 600 °C) was 2366 m2/g with the micropore volume of 0.71 cm3/g and mesopore volume of 0.06 cm3/g. It was found that the carbonization temperature is very important to obtain nanoporous carbon with large specific surface area. The distributions of interlayer spacing were estimated from the power spectra of the TEM images of the carbonized samples. It showed the interlayer spacing of basic structural unit (BSU) decreased from 0.49 nm (BC-0600) through 0.47 nm (BC-0800) to 0.45 nm (BC-1000). The activated carbon was used as the host material of the electrodes of coin type electric double-layer capacitor (EDLC) with organic electrolyte. The observed specific capacitance was 43 F/g (23 F/cm3) for the activated carbon (carbonized at 600 °C), comparable to 44 F/g (22 F/cm3) of commercial activated carbon (MSP). The corresponding values for the activated carbons (carbonized at 800 °C and 1000 °C) were 40 F/g (23 F/cm3) and 17 F/g (12 F/cm3), respectively.