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J. Phys. Chem. C 2010, 114, 11314–11319
Enhancement of Hydrogen Storage Capacity of Zeolite-Templated Carbons by Chemical Activation Marta Sevilla,†,‡ Nurul Alam,† and Robert Mokaya*,† School of Chemistry, UniVersity of Nottingham, UniVersity Park, Nottingham NG7 2RD, U.K., and Instituto Nacional del Carbo´n (CSIC), P.O. Box 73, 33080 OViedo, Spain ReceiVed: March 18, 2010; ReVised Manuscript ReceiVed: May 21, 2010
Chemical activation of zeolite-templated carbons (ZTCs) with KOH increases their textural properties and enhances hydrogen storage capacity. The KOH activation, at a carbon/KOH weight ratio of 1:4, was performed at 800 °C for 1 h. The surface area of the zeolite Y templated carbons, which possessed moderate zeolite-like structural ordering, increased by up to 84%, while the pore volume more than doubled. The surface area increased from 1400-1650 to between 1850 and 3100 m2/g, whereas the pore volume rose from 0.8-1.1 to 1.5-1.75 cm3/g. In general, small pore channels with sizes
