Honeycomb-like Hard Carbon Derived from Pine Pollen as High-Performance Anode Material for Sodium-Ion Batteries

Abstract

Sodium-ion batteries are regarded as one of the most promising energy storage systems, but the choice of anode material is still facing great challenges. Biomass carbon materials were explored for their low cost and wide range of sources. Here, a hard carbon material with a "honeycomb" structure using pine pollen (PP) as a precursor was successfully prepared and applied as an anode. The initial discharge capacity can reach 370 mA h g −1 at a current density of 0.1 A g −1 . After cycling 200 times, the reversible capacity also stabled at 203.3 mA h g −1 with the retention rate of 98%. We further studied the sodium storage mechanism by different methods, especially the Na + diffusivity coefficient (D Na + ) calculated by galvanostatic intermittent titration technique, which was more accurate. Interestingly, the trend of D Na + coincides with cyclic voltammetry curves. Carbonized PP exhibited excellent electrochemical properties because of its three-dimensional structure and larger layer spacing (∼0.41 nm), which reduces the resistance of sodium ions to intercalation and deintercalation.

Double Morphology of Co9S8 Coated by N, S Co-doped Carbon as Efficient Anode Materials for Sodium-Ion Batteries

“…Figure 4b and Additional file 1: Figure S5b display the charge/discharge curves for different cycles of Co 9 S 8 @NSC and NSC with the initial coulombic efficiency (CE) of 54.1% and 28.3%, respectively. The relatively low CE is caused by the irreversible formation of SEI film and electrolyte consumption [7]. The curves of these two samples manifest distinctive voltage platform of Co 9 S 8 and carbon, which are in accord with the results of CV tests (Fig.…”

“…And the electrochemical potential of Na (− 2.71 V vs the standard hydrogen electrode, SHE) is higher than that of Li (− 3.04 V) with 330 mV, which makes SIBs possible to meet large-scale energy storage demands [4][5][6]. However, the most important challenge in SIBs is the large volume expansion during the process of sodiation originated from the great strain derived from the larger radius of Na + (1.02 Å) than Li + (0.76 Å) [7,8]. This will result in severe pulverization and exfoliation of active materials from copper foil and further lead to poor cycling performance.…”

Construction of Ultrathin Nitrogen-Doped Porous Carbon Nanospheres Coated With Polyaniline Nanorods for Asymmetric Supercapacitors

“…Therefore, numerous biomass-based carbon combining hierarchical pores and heteroatom doping have gained considerable attentions, resulting in pesudocapacitance and electrical double layer capacitance. Carbonization of natural biomass materials, including seaweeds (Kang et al, 2015), peanut shell (Ding et al, 2015), rice bran (Hou et al, 2014), plant leaves (Liu B. et al, 2017; Zhang et al, 2018; Zhao et al, 2018), fruit (Wu et al, 2014), and wheat flour (Wu et al, 2015; Yu et al, 2016), has been investigated. It is demonstrated as a feasible approach, which could result in a low cost and eco-friendly way to prepare hierarchical porous carbon electrodes.…”

Sustainable Battery Materials from Biomass

“…From the viewpoint of sustainability, carbon materials derived from waste biomass are especially interesting . In recent years, carbons made from rice husks, corn or wheat straw, coir pith, soy bean residues (from tofu production), pistachio shells, wood chips or fibers, grass, pine pollen, lignin, tannic acid, or shrimp shells, among others, have been introduced as anode materials in lithium‐ or sodium‐based batteries. Similarly, all kinds of biowaste have been carbonized and used as host materials in the cathodes of lithium–sulfur, lithium–selenium, or lithium–oxygen batteries.…”