Hydrogen storage in bulk graphene-related materials

Hydrogen sorption properties of graphene-related materials were studied by gravimetric and volumetric methods at 2931< and 77K. Rapid thermal exfoliation of different types of graphite oxide (GO) precursors yielded samples with maximal surface areas up to 850 m(2)/g, whereas surface areas up to 2300 m(2)/g were achieved by post-exfoliation activation treatments. Therefore, hydrogen storage parameters of graphene materials could be evaluated in a broad range of surface areas. The H-2 uptake vs surface area trend revealed in this study shows that hydrogen storage by graphene materials do not exceed 1 Wt% at 120 Bar H-2 at ambient temperatures. Linear increase of hydrogen adsorption vs surface area was observed at 77 K with maximal observed value of similar to 5 Wt% for 2300 m(2)/g sample. It can be concluded that bulk graphene samples obtained using graphite oxide exfoliation and activation follow standard for other nanostructured carbons hydrogen uptake trends and do not demonstrate superior hydrogen storage parameters reported in several earlier studies. Nevertheless, graphene remains to be one of the best materials for physisorption of hydrogen, especially at low temperatures. (c) 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.