Large scale production of biomass-derived nitrogen-doped porous carbon materials for supercapacitors

In this work, we present a facile approach to synthesize nitrogen-doped porous carbon materials via a two-step fabrication process using the stem bark of broussonetia papyrifera (BP) as the biomass precursor. Firstly, the BP stem bark is hydrothermally treated in a KOH aqueous solution. After filtration and drying, the hydrothermal product is directly subjected to simultaneous pyrolysis and activation, giving nitrogen-doped porous carbon materials. The morphology, structure and textural properties of the carbon materials are investigated by scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microscopy, N-2 sorption isotherms, and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. The obtained porous carbon exhibits a high BET surface area of 1212 m(2) g (1) and an average pore size of 3.8 nm. Such porous carbon shows outstanding capacitive performance (320 F g (1) at 0.5 A g (1)), good rate capacitive behavior, and excellent cycling stability due to the synergistic effect of N, O-doped species, indicating a great potential for supercapacitors. (C) 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.