Evaluation of Microporosity, Pore Tortuosity, and Connectivity of Montmorillonite Solids Pillared with LaNiOx Binary Oxide. A Combined Application of the CPSM Model, the αs-Plot Method and a Pore Percolation−Connectivity Model

Abstract

The present work deals with the comparative application of the CPSM (corrugated pore structure model), the αs plot and the pore connectivity methods for pore structure analysis and especially the detection of microporosity of a category of montmorillonite clays pillared with LaNiOx binary oxide. A quite good agreement between the corresponding results deduced from the three methods was confirmed. The raising of the LaNiOx content caused a change of pore volume, surface area, and microporosity whereas the relevant curves pass through a maximum. The CPSM model, through the simulation of gas sorption hysteresis, enables the evaluation of unified mesomicropore size distributions, pore surface areas, tortuosity factors, τCPSM, and relative microporosities. It is also concluded that pore tortuosity, (τCPSM), is inversely proportional to the pore connectivity factor (c), and the nominal pore length (Ns) (i.e., a CPSM parameter) is proportional to the number of pore lengths (L) (i.e., a parameter of the pore conn...