Wednesday, February 18, 2015

Swellable, Water- and Acid-Tolerant Polymer Sponges for Chemoselective Carbon Dioxide Capture



Swellable, Water- and Acid-Tolerant Polymer Sponges for Chemoselective Carbon Dioxide Capture
Type
Journal Article
Author
Robert T. Woodward
Author
Lee A. Stevens
URL
Volume
136
Issue
25
Pages
9028-9035
Publication
Journal of the American Chemical Society
Date
2014
Abstract
To impact carbon emissions, new materials for carbon capture must be inexpensive, robust, and able to adsorb CO2 specifically from a mixture of other gases. Materials must be tolerant to water vapor and to the acidic impurities that are present in gas streams produced by using fossil fuels to generate electricity. Authors describe a porous organic polymer possessing excellent CO2 capacity and high CO2 selectivity under conditions relevant to precombustion CO2 capture.
Unlike polar adsorbents, such as zeolite 13x and the metal organic framework, HKUST-1, the CO2 adsorption capacity for the hydrophobic polymer is barely affected by the adsorption of water vapor. The polymer is stable even to boiling in concentrated acid for extended periods, a property matched by few microporous adsorbents. The polymer adsorbs CO2 in a way which differs from rigid materials by physical swelling, much as a sponge adsorbs water. This gives rise to a higher CO2 capacities and much better CO2 selectivity than for other water-tolerant, nonswellable frameworks, such as activated carbon and ZIF-8. The polymer has superior function as a selective gas adsorbent, although its constituent monomers are very simple organic feedstocks, as would be required for materials preparation on the large industrial scales required for carbon capture.

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