A study on pore development mechanism of activated carbons from polymeric precursor: Effects of carbonization temperature and nano crystallite formation

In this work, activated polymer-based hard carbons (APHS) with high specific surface area and pore volume were prepared by optimizing the carbonization temperature prior to H2O activation. Structural properties were studied using Raman and X-ray diffraction. N2 adsorption–desorption isotherm characteristics at 77 K were confirmed using the Brunauer-Emmett-Teller equations. APHS were applied as an electrode for electrical double layer capacitors (EDLC). From the results, the specific surface area and total pore volume of the APHSs were determined to be 1760–2340 m2/g and 0.86–1.20 cm3/g, respectively, according to the carbonization temperature. It was revealed that the pore structure depended on the functions of crystallinity and carbonization temperature. The EDLC performance of the prepared APHS was found to be 127 F/g and 50 F/cc for APHS-7-9-4. This is 14% better performance than with commercial YP50F (95 F/g, 44 F/cc). From these results, it was confirmed that the energy storage characteristics of APHS depend strongly on the crystal size, which varies according to the initial conditions of the hard carbon production.