Preparation of Tectona grandis Leaves derived Activated Carbon for High-Performance Supercapacitor Application

Abstract

In energy-based applications, biomass porous micro/nanostructures activated carbon materials are the significant candidates, because of their high specific surface area, superior electrical conductivity, affordability and environmental friendliness. In this work, the activated carbon was prepared from Tectona grandis leaves as a biomass, and thus activated by 25% K₂CO₃ solution. The prepared carbon was designated as TGLAC. Second carbon was prepared from TGLAC was doped with urea and named as N-doped TGLAC. The physico-chemical analytical methods were employed to access the phase structure, bonding nature and morphological properties of the freshly prepared activated carbon material. Three electrode systems were utilized to estimate the supercapacitor features in 1 M Na₂SO₄ electrolyte. The prepared activated carbon electrode provides a specific capacitance of 371 F g^–1 at 1 A g^–1 and a 62% rate capability at 5 A g^–1. It retains 94% of its initial capacitance during the cyclic stability analysis at 5 A g^–1 over 5,000 cycles. This study demonstrates that carbon based materials obtained from sustainable waste biomass can exhibit favourable electrochemical performance in energy applications, providing a clear and feasible synthetic approach and strategy for their utilization.