The electrochemistry of activated carbonaceous materials: past, present, and future

Carbonaceous materials are widely used in electrochemistry. All allotropic forms of carbons—graphite, glassy carbon, amorphous carbon, fullerenes, nanotubes, and doped diamond—are used as important electrode materials in all fields of modern electrochemistry. Examples include graphite and amorphous carbons as anode materials in high-energy density rechargeable Li batteries, porous carbon electrodes in sensors and fuel cells, nano-amorphous carbon as a conducting agent in many kinds of composite electrodes (e.g., cathodes based on intercalation inorganic host materials for batteries), glassy carbon and doped diamond as stable robust and high stability electrode materials for all aspects of basic electrochemical studies, and more. Amorphous carbons can be activated to form very high specific surface area (yet stable) electrode materials which can be used for electrostatic energy storage and conversion [electrical double-layer capacitors (EDLC)] and separation techniques based on electro-adsorption, such as water desalination by capacitive de-ionization (CDI). Apart from the many practical aspects of activated carbon electrodes, there are many highly interesting and important basic aspects related to their study, including transport phenomena, molecular sieving behavior, correlation between electrochemical behavior and surface chemistry, and more. In this article, we review several important aspects related to these electrode materials, in a time perspective (past, present, and future), with the emphasis on their importance to EDLC devices and CDI processes.