Owing to their low cost, good performance, and high lifetime stability, activated carbons (ACs) with a large surface area rank among the most popular materials deployed in commercially available electrochemical double-layer (EDLC) capacitors. Here, we report a simple two-step synthetic procedure for the preparation of activated carbon from natural flax. Such ACs possess a very high specific surface area (1649 m2 g-1) accompanied by a microporous structure with the size of pores below 2 nm. These features are behind the extraordinary electrochemical performance of flax-derived ACs in terms of their high values of specific capacitance (500 F g-1 at a current density of 0.25 A g-1 in the three-electrode setup and 189 F g-1 at a current density of 0.5 A g-1 in two-electrode setup.), high-rate stability, and outstanding lifetime capability (85% retention after 150,000 charging/discharging cycles recorded at the high current density of 5 A g-1). These findings demonstrate that flax-based ACs have more than competitive potential compared to standard and commercially available activated carbons.

Czech Advanced Technology and Research Institute Palacký University Olomouc Šlechtitelů 27 783 71 Olomouc Czech Republic

Department of Environmental Protection in Industry Faculty of Materials Science and Technology VSB Technical University of Ostrava 17 Listopadu 2172 15 708 00 Ostrava Poruba Czech Republic

Department of Physical Chemistry Faculty of Science Palacký University 17 Listopadu 1192 12 779 00 Olomouc Czech Republic

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Editorial for the Special Issue on "Graphene-Related Materials: Synthesis and Applications"