Conducting Polymer Paper-Derived Mesoporous 3D N-doped Carbon Current Collectors for Na and Li Metal Anodes: A Combined Experimental and Theoretical Study

Herein, the manufacturing of a free-standing N-doped mesoporous carbon (CPPY) paper by straightforward carbonization of polypyrrole-coated nanocellulose paper is described. The deposition of Na and Li on these CPPY electrodes, which also serve as current collectors, is studied using a combination of experiments and theoretical calculations. The porous CPPY electrodes gave rise to decreased current densities, which helped to prolong the life-time of the Na electrodes. While the density functional theory calculations suggest that both Na and Li should be deposited uniformly on the CPPY electrodes, the experimental results clearly show that the sodium deposition was more well-defined on the surface of the CPPY electrodes. In contrast to Li, dendrite-free Na depositions could be carried out using deposition capacities up to 12 mAh cm –2 and a stable Na electrode cycling performance was found during 1000 h at 1 mA cm –2 . The results suggest that it was difficult to predict the Na or Li deposition behavior merely based on calculations of the metal adsorption energies, as kinetic effects should also be taken into account. Nevertheless, the experimental results clearly show that the use of the present type of porous electrodes provides new possibilities for the development of durable Na electrodes for high-performance sodium metal batteries.