A high density of vertically-oriented graphenes for use in electric double layer capacitors

The growth, capacitance and frequency response of vertically-oriented graphenes grown by radio frequency plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition on nickel substrates and used as electrodes in electric double layer capacitors (EDLCs) are presented. The graphenes grown on the grain boundary of substrates show a faster growth rate, but less ordered structure than in the center of the nickel grain. At a few nanometers away from the grain boundaries the graphenes grow vertically at the rate of 70–80 nm per minute. The film height increased linearly with growth time from 700 nm (10 min sample) to 3.1 μm (40 min sample). Raman spectra show that the intensity ratio of the D band to G band gradually decreased with growth time to a value of 0.5, indicating that the crystalline order of the graphene increases with height. The specific capacitance of symmetric, parallel plate EDLC devices fabricated with these films was found to increase in a linear fashion with growth time up to values greater than 120 μF/cm2 at 1 kHz. An impedance phase angle of −45° was reached at 30 kHz. Specific capacitance normalized to growth height suggests that mechanisms other than double layer charge storage on planar surface area were operative.