Biomass waste inspired nitrogen-doped porous carbon materials as high-performance anode for lithium-ion batteries

It is found that nitrogen-doping with different electronegativity could create a unique electronic structure and might bring in special synergistic effects. Duckweed is a natural, abundantly available, and yearly renewable source, consisting of nitrogen as well as carbon. Herein, we present a cost-effective approach to dispose of duckweed to yield nitrogen doped porous carbon materials (SNCMs) through direct carbonization. It is found that the SNCMs-800 obtained at 800 degrees C exhibit a high special surface area, and the content of nitrogen is 4.31 atom%. As an anode material for lithium-ion batteries, SNCMs-800 retains a capacity of 1071 mAh g(-1) after 100 cycles at a current density of 100 mA g(-1), and 630 mAh g(-1) after 1000 cycles at a high current density of 1 A g(-1), which suggests that it has a promising potential for wild applications in the field of energy storage devices. Furthermore, this strategy not only addresses the disposal issue of biomass waste, but also generates valuable functional carbon materials at large scale from the discard. (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.