Gas to carbon nanomaterials for energy storage

Supercapacitor and Li-ion batteries with high energy and power density as well as good stability are highly desired for energy storage in electric vehicles, power line conditioners, and load leveling of solar energy and wind power. The aim of this project is to design and fabricate advanced energy storage devices using electrode materials based on aligned carbon nanotube on metal foils, and three dimensional high surface area carbon materials to achieve the goals for energy storage in the project. During last years we developed novel carbon sponge-ionic liquid supercapacitors with ultrahigh energy. It shows a much better specific energy at high specific powers than commercial Li ion battery. It delivered the capacitance up to 290 F/g at 20 oC, which is among one of the highest recorded double layer capacitance. At the temperature of 60 oC, the capacitance of the material with IL electrolyte increases up to 387 F/g, resulting in a high energy density. The supercapacitors using the mesopore-rich carbon produced from biomass displayed a good performance in both organic electrolyte and ionic liquid electrolytes: the constant capacitance of 146 F/g from 1 A/g to 10 A/g in commercial TEABF4/AN electrolyte, and the capacitance of 224 F/g at 0.1A/g with a high energy of 92 Wh/kg in ionic liquid. The project also developed aligned CNT@MnO2 core shell nanotube array on stainless steel foils and alumina foils, which has shown very good performance as both cathode and anode in Li ion batteries.

The project will mainly focus on conversion of natural gas to aligned carbon nanotubes ACNT on Al foils as electrodes. The ACNT on Al foils will be developed as a platform to incorporate different pseudocapacitive materials such as conductive polymers or oxides to form core shell nanotubes (CNT@ pseudocapacitive materials). In this way, nanoelectrode arrays will be produced where each core-shell nanotube will serve as a single nanoelectrode. The novel electrodes will have common features: hybrid multifunc tional, high surface area, high electric conductivity, short transport path of charges, electrons ions or protons. The project will focus most on application of the nanoelectrode arrays to supercapacitors with high energy and power density. The project wi ll also explore our nanoelectrode array to Li battery, which will be evaluated and compared to supercapacitors. At the end of the project, principles and parameters for scaling up the synthesis ACNT on Al foils will be provided, and supercapacitors with h igh energy (10-50 Wh/kg based on whole cell mass) and power density will be demonstrated in relatively large cells. The project supports GASSMAKS at the end to increase the Norwegian gas value through producing advanced energy storage devices based on car bon nanomaterials produced from Norwegian natural gas. The project will help Norwegian industries to take a good position in the very rapidly growing energy storage market relating to renewable energy production and electric or hydride cars.