Search

Supercapacitors are the best choice when there is a need to deliver high power to the consumer or to store energy. Hybrid supercapacitors with their beneficial characteristics can somewhat overcome the basic lack of batteries, that is the low power density, and when supercapacitors are combined with batteries, the current maximum power can be increased and the lifetime extended. The number of research studies on development of new materials and construction technologies for supercapacitors has been increasing steadily in recent years. As a result, production of commercial devices and their applications are constantly growing, with improved product properties. Here we present the current state of development of supercapacitors as highly promising energy storage systems by an overview of operation principles, main components and various electrode materials and electrolytes, as well as description of different modes of production. A special attention was paid to the need of a good match of the active material and electrolytes, in order to achieve high capacity of the device. The electrode/electrolyte phase optimization is the key to maximizing characteristics of a supercapacitor, especially the capacitance. In selecting the materials, requirements of the final application must be considered, such as the specific energy and power, energy and power density, and service life-time. In addition to material selection, design and optimization of the cell configuration provide new opportunities for development of hybrid battery/supercapacitor systems. Demand for such systems will increase in future, when using a battery or a supercapacitor alone will not be able to meet specific needs, such as the energy density, number of charge and discharge cycles or voltage. Finally, equally important as the development of materials and cells, are the electrode production technology and the cell construction, which need to be optimized in order to improve supercapacitor properties. [Project of the Serbian Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development, Grant no. 172060: Nov pristup dizajniranju materijala za konverziju i skladištenje energije, kao i bilateralnog projekta Srbija Hrvatska: Superkondenzatori visoke snage zasnovani na grafen/pseudokapacitivnim materijalima]

For the preparation of RuO2 coatings on Ti substrate, the RuO2 was synthesized in acidic aqueous medium by simple one-step low temperature-controlled microwave (MW) irradiation. The physical composition of synthesized solid phase was analysed through particle size distribution (PSD), whereas the coating was investigated for its capacitive response and activity in oxygen evolution reaction (OER). The oxide phase was found highly polydisperse, with overlapped fractions within rather narrow particle size range and clear tendency toward agglomeration. The smallest particles and their best resolved fractions were synthesized at the temperature just above the boiling point of the reaction medium, and quite below the chloride-to-oxide conversion temperature. Consequently, the highest OER activity was registered for RuO2/Ti anodes prepared from this sample, with strong indication of different oxide structure, with respect to the electrodes prepared from samples synthesized at higher temperatures. However, the coatings from high temperature samples have considerably higher capacitance than those synthesized at lower temperatures. These findings can be rather correlated to the MW temperature-dependent oxide structure than to different morphology analysed through PSD.

Porous electrochemical supercapacitive materials, as an important type of new-generation energy storage devices, require a detailed analysis and knowledge of their capacitive performances upon different charging/discharging regimes. The investigation of the responses to dynamic perturbations of typical representatives, noble metal oxides, carbonaceous materials and RuO2-impregnated carbon blacks, by electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) is presented. This presentation follows a brief description of supercapacitive behavior and origin of pseudocapacitive response of noble metal oxides. For all investigated materials, the electrical charging/discharging equivalent of the EIS response was found to obey the transmission line model envisaged as so-called „resistor/capacitor (RC) ladder“. The ladder features are correlated to material physicochemical properties, its composition and the composition of the electrolyte. Fitting of the EIS data of different supercapacitive materials to appropriate RC ladders enables the in-depth profiling of the capacitance and pore resistance of their porous thin-layers and finally the complete revelation of capacitive energy storage issues. [Projekat Ministarstva nauke Republike Srbije, br. 172060]