Microwave-assisted hydrothermal synthesis of HCN@NiS composite electrodes for supercapacitors

Abstract

In recent decades, rapid urbanisation, industrialisation and global population growth have led to environmental degradation and the depletion of non-renewable energy sources. However, these green and environmentally friendly new energy sources are often affected by the climatic environment and region, so the energy produced has shortcomings such as intermittency and instability, requiring energy storage devices with high energy and power density. In this study, hollow carbon nanorods (HCN) were obtained in one step and HCN structures were coated with nickel sulphide (NiS) by microwave-assisted hydrothermal method. The obtained samples were characterised by SEM and EDX. Morphological properties show that NiS is coated on carbons with a complete nanorod structure. As a result, HCN@NiS obtained by microwave-assisted hydrothermal synthesis, which is a fast, easy and inexpensive method, provides a capacitance of 0.15 F/cm2 at a current density of 1 mA/cm2 . Electrochemical test results show that it provides a large number of reactive sites and shows better electrochemical properties. In the light of these results, it is understood that microwave-assisted material synthesis may be suitable synthesis conditions for supercapacitors in the future.