Ultra-thick electrodes based on activated wood-carbon towards high-performance quasi-solid-state supercapacitors

Abstract

Wood carbon (WC)-derived thick electrode design has recently received increasing interest because of its high energy density at the device level. Herein, a facile, low-cost, and efficient strategy by surface engineering to synthesize ultrathick electrodes of quasi-solid-state symmetric supercapacitors (SSCs) based on activated wood-carbon (AWC) monoliths is presented. The AWC as a freestanding ultrathick electrode shows an impressive areal capacitance of 6.85 F cm⁻² at 1 mA cm⁻² and 4.55 F cm⁻² at 20 mA cm⁻². Furthermore, a quasi-solid-state SSC assembled by two identical AWC monoliths delivers an excellent energy density of 0.23 mW h cm⁻² (4.59 W h kg⁻¹ and 0.77 W h L⁻¹) at 500 mW cm⁻² (9.9 mW kg⁻¹ and 2500 W L⁻¹) while maintaining a capacitance retention of 86% after 10 000 cycles. The remarkable electrochemical performance is associated with the structural integrity of natural wood, the introduction of oxygen-containing functional groups, and the ultrathick electrode design, which significantly enhance electroactive material loading and device integration.