Biomass Waste Carbonization in Piranha Solution: A Route to Hypergolic Carbons?

In the present work we report for the first time the carbonization of biomass waste, such as stale bread and spent coffee, in piranha solution (H2SO4-H2O2) at ambient conditions. Carbonization is fast and exothermic, resulting in the formation of carbon nanosheets at decent yields of 25–35%, depending on the starting material. The structure and morphology of the nanosheets were verified by X-ray diffraction, Raman, X-ray photoelectron and microscopy techniques. Interestingly, the obtained carbon spontaneously ignites upon contact with fuming nitric acid HNO3 at ambient conditions, thus offering a rare example of hypergolicity involving carbon as the solid fuel (i.e., hypergolic carbon). Based on the relatively large interlayer spacing of the as-produced carbons, a simple structural model is proposed for the observed hypergolicity, wherein HNO3 molecules fit in the gallery space of carbon, thus exposing its basal plane and defect sites to a spontaneous reaction with the strong oxidizing agent. This finding may pave the way towards new type hypergolic propellants based on carbon, the latter exclusively obtained by the carbonization of biomass waste in piranha solution.