Carbon nitride in energy conversion and storage: recent advances and future prospects

With the explosive growth of energy consumption, the exploration of highly efficient energy conversion and storage devices becomes increasingly important. Fuel cells, supercapacitors, and lithium-ion batteries are among the most promising options. The innovation of these devices mainly resides in the development of high-performance electrode materials and catalysts. Graphitic carbon nitride (g-C3 N4 ), due to structural and chemical properties such as semiconductor optical properties, rich nitrogen content, and tunable porous structure, has drawn considerable attention and shown great potential as an electrode material or catalyst in energy conversion and storage devices. This review covers recent progress in g-C3 N4 -containing systems for fuel cells, electrocatalytic water splitting devices, supercapacitors, and lithium-ion batteries. The corresponding catalytic mechanisms and future research directions in these areas are also discussed.