A research team at Monash University, Melbourne, Australia, has made a graphene-based supercapacitor with an energy density to rival batteries, thus overcoming the shortfall of previous supercapacitors.
The university’s Department of Materials Engineering has been working to make a supercapacitor that is smaller with a greater energy density for use in portable devices.
The engineers identified the large pores in the carbon sheets usually used in supercapacitors as an area for improvement of energy density.
By substituting the carbon sheets for graphene the team was able to increase the energy density to 60W/h per litre, this is 12 times greater than current supercaps.
The use of graphene also means the supercapacitor is more compact than when carbon sheets are used and does not require frequent charging.
