Performance Enhancement of Carbon Nanomaterials for Supercapacitors

Abstract

Carbon nanomaterials such as carbon nanotubes, carbon nanofibers, and graphene are exploited extensively due to their unique electrical, mechanical, and thermal properties and recently investigated for energy storage application (supercapacitor) due to additional high specific surface area and chemical inertness properties. The supercapacitor is an energy storage device which, in addition to long cycle life (one million), can give energy density higher than parallel plate capacitor and power density higher than battery. In this paper, carbon nanomaterials and their composites are reviewed for prospective use as electrodes for supercapacitor. Moreover, different physical and chemical treatments on these nanomaterials which can potentially enhance the capacitance are also reviewed.