Trichosanthes cucumerina derived activated carbon: the potential electrode material for high energy symmetric supercapacitor

Abstract High surface area porous activated carbons obtained from sustainable biomass are excellent functional materials for energy storage applications. This is the first report on snake gourd (Trichosanthes cucumerina) pericarp as a raw material of activated carbon and supercapacitor electrode material. Herein, a simple KOH activation and carbonisation method is used. The obtained SGC900 sample has a surface area of 1841 m 2 /g and an average pore volume of 0.52 cm 3 /g. SGC900 based supercapacitor exhibits good electrochemical storage capacity in 1 M H 2 SO 4 with a specific capacitance of 206 F/g at 1 A/g. The symmetric device delivered an energy density of 11 Wh/kg at a power density of 1.6 kW/kg. It provides a series resistance (R s ) of 1.2 Ω and a charge transfer resistance R ct of 1.9 Ω. Furthermore, the device retains 95 % of capacitance over 5000 cycles. This work presents an easy and feasible approach for producing value‐added activated carbon from sustainable biomass, potentially used in high‐performance energy storage.