Fossil fuels, which contribute significantly to anthropogenic CO2 emissions, are likely to remain the main source of energy in the foreseeable future. Therefore, the development of efficient carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies is one of the great challenges faced by humanity. A new advancement in the area of CCS includes the utilization of captured CO2 as a chemical feedstock, resulting in new approaches to carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCUS). While a wide range of materials ranging from aqueous amine solvents to solid sorbents are being developed, a reactive system that can effectively host both CO2 capture and conversion do not exist. Thus, a new class of nano-scale materials called Nanoparticle Organic Hybrid Materials (NOHMs) has been developed as an alternative CO2 capture media that also has a potential to host subsequent CO2 conversion. NOHMs consist of inorganic cores with a grafted polymeric canopy providing negligible vapor pressure, great thermal stability, and interesting chemical and physical tunability. Both entropic and enthalpic interactions among polar fluid units, solid surfaces and gaseous molecules are investigated, while correlating the molecular level understanding macroscale properties such as the sorption and diffusion behaviors and reactivity of CO2 molecules in NOHMs. NOHMs’ unique electrolytic properties in the presence of various secondary fluids and salts are evaluated to design them as a dual-purpose reactive media for combined CO2 capture and conversion. This CCUS scheme would capture and convert CO2 in an innovatively integrated pathway, and therefore, has a great potential to improve the overall sustainability.

Novel liquid-like nano-scale hybrid materials with tunable chemical and structural properties for combined CO2 capture and conversion

253rd National Meeting (2017)

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