The preparation of porous carbon from bio-based phthalonitrile resins by a non-template method: Curing, carbonization and its basic properties

Resin-based porous carbon materials are considered to be an important direction for CO 2 adsorption and supercapacitors due to their controllable chemical structure, large specific surface area, and stable physicochemical properties. But at present, the main source of resin-based porous carbon materials is petroleum-based polymer materials, which is incongruous with the tenets of green chemistry. Here, a bio-based phthalonitrile precursor containing s- triazine ring structure (TDPH) was synthesized from vanillin, then a nitrogen/oxygen co-doped hierarchical porous carbon with excellent properties, was prepared using TDPH via a two-step process, with urea/zinc chloride as hardener and potassium hydroxide as activator, respectively. The carbon material prepared under optimal conditions can achieve a maximum CO 2 adsorption capacity of 6.81 mmol g −1 at 273 K due to its high specific surface area (1607 m 2 g −1 ) and high N/O content (7.06 wt%/14.74 wt%). It is worth noting that the CO 2 adsorption capacity at 298 K can still reach 96.3 % of the initial adsorption after 7 cycles. In addition, the electrochemical properties of the resultant porous carbon were tested under a 1 M H 2 SO 4 three-electrode system, and the highest specific capacitance at a current density of 0.1 A g −1 was 473 F g −1 and the specific capacitance retention can still reach 87 % after 65,000 cycles. This work broadens the source of resin-based porous carbon materials and paves a new way for the functionalization of bio-based resins.