A study of ion charge transfer on electrochemical behaviors of poly(vinylidene fluoride)-derived carbon electrodes

In this work, porous carbon with a high specific surface area as electrode materials for supercapacitors are obtained by a carbonization process at various temperatures from 700 °C to 1000 °C without activation process using poly(vinylidene fluoride) (PVDF) as a carbon precursor. The electrochemical performance is characterized by cyclic voltammetry and galvanostatic charge–discharge cycling performance using two-electrode system in 6.0 M KOH as an aqueous electrolyte. The results indicate that carbonization temperature significantly affected the specific surface area and pore volume of the PVDF-derived carbons and their capacitive behavior. In particular, the electrochemical performance of the prepared PVDF-derived carbon is determined by both the electric double-layer capacitance and the pseudo-capacitance resulting from the residual surface functional groups on PVDF-derived carbons.

► Microporous carbon containing functional groups were prepared by only carbonization.
► Micropores on carbons were formed by the release of fluorine during carbonization.
► The functional groups and pore features were controlled by carbonization temperature.
► Microporous carbon showed high specific capacitance of the range of 201–249 F g−1.
► It was probably attributed to the easy electrolyte ion transfer and pseudocapacitance.