Dalton Transactions (Print Edition) 2015-09-07

Reduced graphene oxide anchored Cu(OH)2 as a high performance electrochemical supercapacitor.

Atin Pramanik, Sandipan Maiti, Sourindra Mahanty

Index: Dalton Trans. 44 , 14604-12, (2015)

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Abstract

Developing new materials for electrochemical supercapacitors with higher energy density has recently gained tremendous impetus in the context of effective utilization of renewable energy. Herein, we report a simple one-pot synthesis of bundled nanorods of Cu(OH)2 embedded in a matrix of reduced graphene oxide (Cu(OH)2@RGO) under mild hydrothermal conditions of 80 °C for 1 h. The synthesized material shows a high BET surface area of 78.7 m(2) g(-1) and a mesoporous nature with a broad pore-size distribution consisting of structural pores as well as inter-particle pores. Raman spectroscopy suggests an intimate interaction between Cu(OH)2 and reduced graphene oxide (RGO) creating more defects by destruction of sp(2) domains which would help the defect-assisted charge transport during electrochemical processes. When investigated as an electrochemical supercapacitor, Cu(OH)2@RGO shows a high capacitance of 602 F g(-1) at 0.2 A g(-1) in 1 M KOH in a three-electrode cell configuration. Detailed electrochemical studies indicate that the Faradic processes are diffusion controlled and follow a quasi-reversible kinetics. Further, a two-electrode symmetric cell shows good energy density and power density (84.5 Wh kg(-1) at 0.55 kW kg(-1) and 20.5 Wh kg(-1) at 5.5 kW kg(-1)) characteristics demonstrating superior application potential of this common low-cost transition metal hydroxide for high performance energy storage devices.