Balancing the CO2 adsorption properties and the regeneration energy consumption via the functional molecular engineering hierarchical pore-interface structure

Abstract

How to combine the green fabrication process of advanced materials with the engineering of microscope surface functionalization, simultaneously constructing the relationship between the micro-structure and macroscopic energy consumption from the molecular-level, is the significant issue for revealing the process energy consumption towards ultra-low emission flue gas CO2 storage in science-engineer field. Herein, following the research-line of ‘molecular interface structure → CO2 adsorption properties → regeneration energy consumption’, we facilely synthesized an amine-grafted hierarchical porous material (1,2-epoxyhexane (EH) modified Polyethyleneimine (PEI) grafted into glucose-based carbon sphere (GCS)), which presents excellent performance on CO2 adsorption and lower regeneration energy consumption. As for (EH modified PEI)-grafted glucose-based carbon sphere (EH@PEI-GCS), the strategy of increasing the effective amines ratio and reducing the pore blockage is helpful to construct a molecular-modified porous 3D-interface achieving a CO2 adsorption capacity of 5.34 mmol/g and a CO2/N2 (the ratio of Volume: 15%:85%) separation factor of 100.5 at 313 K and 1 bar. Impressively, compared with the different modified molecule configurations, the EH@PEI-GCS can dramatically improve the water resistance, thermal/cycle stability and lower the regeneration energy consumption, simultaneously without remarkable adsorption capacity losing. Comprehensively, it is critical to declare the relationship between the molecular-modified pore surface structure and regeneration energy consumption, and even to bridge the Micro-hierarchical materials science with Macro-energy engineer field.