Design of an organic waste based supercapacitor and evaluation of its electrochemical performance

Recently, intensive studies have been carried out on supercapacitors, which have some advantages over batteries used for energy storage and traditional capacitors. Especially because of their high carbon content, porous structure, good electronic conductivity and high stability, biomass precursors are the most used materials in the production of supercapacitor electrodes. In this study, Rheum ribes peel was converted to activated carbon for the first-time using carbonization and different activation methods, and three supercapacitor cells were prepared using these materials. The surface characterizations of the obtained electrode materials were performed using scanning electron microscopy with energy-dispersive X-ray, Brunauer–Emmett–Teller and X-ray diffraction analysis methods. The best specific capacitance value was obtained for the RRP-pure electrode and was 70.82 F g-1 at a current density of 1 A g-1. The cyclic voltammetry curves of electrodes were perfectly obtained and found extremely similar to the ideal supercapacitor curves. The RRP-pure electrode has a maximum energy density of 6.78 Wh kg-1 at a power density of 618.86 W kg-1 and exhibited good stability. For the all-prepared electrodes, the ion exchange between the electrode materials and the electrolyte was at a good level and equivalent series resistance values of the electrodes were low, leading to a positive advantage in energy transmission. In the light of the results obtained; It is thought that the cheap, environmentally friendly, efficient, high-capacity and stable electrodes produced in this study will make them an excellent alternative to traditional methods in the field of energy storage.