Nano Carbon Produced by Advanced Mild Hydrothermal Process of Oil Palm Biomass for Supercapacitor Material

Abstract

Palm oil waste is an abundant biomass resource in Indonesia that is not well utilized as a raw material for producing high value-added materials. One product that is possible to be manufactured from oil palm biomass is activated nano carbon. Characteristics of high porosity and good conductivity will lead the activated nano carbon suitable as an electrode of supercapacitor material. Preparation of activated nano carbon is conducted by two main steps namely carbonization and activation. In this research, carbonization is done by hydrothermal process while activation is done by physico-chemical activation. This study focused on manufacturing activated nano carbon from empty fruit bunches of oil palm with hydrothermal carbonization for supercapacitor applications. The activation of mesopore area of the carbon has been taken place by using ZnCl2 and CaCl2 as a chemical activating agent during the hydrothermal process. The activated nano carbon produced from empty fruit bunches has a surface area of 41-1571 m2/g and a pore size of 2.0-6.8 nm. In this study activated nano carbon is used as a working electrode in symmetric hybrid supercapacitor.