Due to global industrial development, intensive agricultural practices and other anthropogenic causes, water pollution is a critical global concern. Climate change is exacerbated by the disposal of biomass waste decomposing to methane. These issues could be addressed via pyrolysis of biomass to produce bio-fuels and biochar for energy and water treatment, respectively. However, pyrolysis biofuels suffer from high oxygen content and viscosity as well as low yield. Work in our laboratory shows that the co-pyrolysis of biomass and clay minerals increases the yield of bio-fuel and, simultaneously, the adsorption capacity of the biochar residue. In order to probe the chemical versus mechanical nature of biomass component and clay mineral interactions three biomasses (fruit pit, cocoa shells, and rice husk) were pyrolyzed with three clay minerals (kaolinite, montmorillonite and sand) having various cation exchange capacities and inorganic active site groups. Pyrolysis and CO<sub>2</sub> activation are carried out with different biomass:clay ratios at moderate temperatures. This work probes the changes in carbon content, thermal reactivity, activation energy, surface area, porosity, and adsorption capacity/rate as a function of blend ratio and pyrolysis temperature, to explore how clay minerals interact with biomasses to increase devolatilization.

Heterogeneous adsorbents from clay-biomass pyrolysis and CO<sub>2</sub> activation for treatment of heavy metal contaminated water

2019 Fall National Meeting

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Heterogeneous adsorbents from clay-biomass pyrolysis and CO2 activation for treatment of heavy metal contaminated water

Heterogeneous adsorbents from clay-biomass pyrolysis and CO₂ activation for treatment of heavy metal contaminated water