Issue 13, 2014

A novel activating strategy to achieve highly porous carbon monoliths for CO2 capture

Abstract

Highly porous N-doped carbon monoliths have been successfully prepared by using binary H3PO4–HNO3 mixed acid as a co-activating agent for the first time and sodium alginate (SA), a natural biopolymer, as a carbon precursor. The resultant N-doped carbon monoliths have a narrow size distribution and high content of pyrrolic N. Particularly, the sample SA-2N-P with the highest surface area (1740 m2 g−1) exhibits the highest CO2 adsorption capacity of 8.99 mmol g−1 at 273 K and 4.57 mmol g−1 at 298 K, along with an initial CO2 adsorption energy of 43 kJ mol−1 at lower CO2 coverage and 32 kJ mol−1 at higher CO2 coverage. Remarkably, this sample also shows the highest CO2 capacity [66.44 mg (CO2) g−1 (adsorbent) at 25 °C and 0.15 atm] under low CO2 pressures, which is of more relevance for flue gas applications. Furthermore, the selectivity of CO2 over N2 is also calculated for the binary gas mixture [V (N2) : V (CO2) = 85 : 15] according to the ideal adsorbed solution theory (IAST). Combined with its simple preparation, high adsorption capacity, and high selectivity for CO2, the sample SA-2N-P is one of the promising solid-state absorbents reported so far for CO2 capture and storage.

Graphical abstract: A novel activating strategy to achieve highly porous carbon monoliths for CO2 capture

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
13 Nov 2013
Accepted
15 Jan 2014
First published
16 Jan 2014

J. Mater. Chem. A, 2014,2, 4819-4826

Author version available

A novel activating strategy to achieve highly porous carbon monoliths for CO2 capture

X. Ma, Y. Li, M. Cao and C. Hu, J. Mater. Chem. A, 2014, 2, 4819 DOI: 10.1039/C3TA14684G

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