Textural characteristics of activated carbons prepared from agricultural residues-review

Agricultural residues are the most available biomass resources in the world and can be exploited to produce various activated carbons at low cost. The textural properties of activated carbon, including surface area, pore size, pore size distribution, and certain surface functionalities are the main factors in the application of bio-based electrode materials for energy storage devices and electrochemical catalyst for CO2 reduction reactions, gas adsorption and separation, in water and wastewater treatment. This paper reviews the physical characteristics of activated carbons produced from various biomass resources using different methods. The effects of different activation methods, sources of biomass, and other parameters on the surface properties such as specific surface area and pore volume of activated carbon are discussed. The differences in the characteristics of activated carbon made from different agricultural biomass resources under the same parameters are evaluated. Eventually, the application of abundant agricultural residues for fabricating supercapacitors' electrode materials is also discussed.