From Wasted Nonwoven Fabrics to Conductive Flexible Substrates, Composited with Electrospun Porous Carbon Nanofibers for Supercapacitor Electrodes and Electromagnetic Interference Shielding Materials

Abstract

Recently, the growing energy depletion and electromagnetic pollution have become two global issues that urgently need improvement. The development of bifunctional energy storage and electromagnetic interference shielding materials with good performances is quite a challenge. In this study, the surfaces of wasted polypropylene-based nonwoven fabrics (P-NWFs) are coated with silver paste via a facile screen-printing method to prepare conductive flexible substrates. Meanwhile, porous carbon nanofibers (PCNFs) are prepared through electrospinning technology and followed by the high-temperature sintering treatment. Significantly, conductive P-NWFs and PCNFs are composited together to form flexible fabric-based bifunctional materials. For supercapacitor application, the obtained electrode possesses a high specific capacitance of 343 F/g at 1 A/g. Besides, the device made from two electrodes shows a long cycling lifespan, capacitance retention is as high as ∼ 99.68%, after 10,000 cycles during charging/discharging process. For environment application, the obtained electromagnetic interference shielding material possesses a high shielding effectiveness of ∼ 82.4 dB, where, more than 69% of shielding is through absorption mechanism. Briefly, our research provides an innovative path for developing flexible fabric-based bifunctional composite materials for supercapacitor and electromagnetic interference shielding applications.

Keywords: porous carbon nanofiber, conductive nonwoven fabric, flexible electrode, supercapacitor, electromagnetic interference shielding