Co-precipitation reaction: A facile strategy for designing hierarchical porous carbon nanosheets for EDLCs and zinc-ion hybrid supercapacitors

Hierarchical porous carbon is a valuable electrode material for electrochemical energy storage devices by virtue of its high specific surface area, excellent conductivity, and large pore volume. Herein, a simple, convenient and cheap self-made Fe-based template strategy is innovated to prepare hierarchical porous carbon employing coal chemical byproducts anthracene as carbon precursor, which is utilized as electrode materials of electrical double layer capacitors (EDLCs) and zinc ions hybrid supercapacitors (ZHSs). Benefiting from the high specific surface area (2085.1 m(2) g(-1)), feasible micropore content (0.28 cm(3) g(-1)), suitable oxygen content (11.57 at%) and twodimensional nanosheet structure, the optimal sample delivered a high specific capacitance value of 183.5 F g(-1) at 0.05 A/g and excellent rate capability (109.5 F g(-1) at 20 A/g) for symmetric supercapacitor. Meanwhile, the asfabricated ZHSs exhibited remarkable specific capacitance (181.67 mAh/g at 0.05 A/g), superior energy density (145.2 Wh kg(-1)), high power density (14.5 kW kg(-1)) and splendid cycling stability (similar to 91.25 % after 40,000 charge/discharge cycles at 2 A g(-1)). This work affords a new idea for the synthesis of template carbon using a feasible and low-cost co-precipitation reaction route and has great significance for the development of highperformance electrochemical energy storage device.

Automated summary

A hierarchical porous carbon material was prepared using a self-made Fe-based template strategy and anthracene as the carbon precursor. This material exhibited high specific capacitance and excellent cycling stability, showing great potential for high-performance electrochemical energy storage devices.