Production of high surface area activated carbons for energy storage applications using agricultural biomass residue from a C5-biorefinery

Ligno-cellulosic biomass from sustainable sources has been used to produce light weight and high specific surface area (SSA) activated carbons (AC) for a multitude of applications; such as components in energy storage devices such as batteries and supercapacitors. While direct conversion from biomass has been studied heavily, such AC with relatively high surface area can be more effectively produced when leveraged as a co-product from a biorefinery. In this paper, we discuss the production of high specific surface area activated carbons from residual fiber (fiber remaining after extraction of C5-sugars) generated as part of a biorefinery. Our work showed that the AC produced from the residual fiber delivered an order of magnitude higher surface area than the one directly from corn pericarp fiber and soy hulls. These AC were evaluated as electrodes in electrical double layer capacitors for energy storage. These results, along with the benefits of using the residual fiber to produce AC, are highlighted in this paper.