Graphene-based materials for flexible electrochemical energy storage

Sustainable development of renewable energy sources is one of the most important themes that humanity faces in this century. Wide use of renewable energy sources will require a drastically increased ability to store electrical energy. Electrochemical energy storage devices are expected to play a key role. With the increased demand in flexible energy resource for wearable electronic devices, great efforts have been devoted to developing high-quality flexible electrodes for advanced energy storage and conversion systems. Because of its high specific surface area, good chemical stability, high mechanical flexibility, and outstanding electrical properties, graphene, a special allotrope of carbon with two-dimensional mono-layered network of sp(2) hybridized carbon, have been showing great potential in next-generation energy conversion and storage devices. This review presents the latest advances on the flexible graphene-based materials for the most vigorous electrochemical energy storage devices, that is, supercapacitors and lithium-ion batteries. Copyright (c) 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.