Zirconia-Assisted Pyrolysis of Coffee Waste in CO2 Environment for the Simultaneous Production of Fuel Gas and Composite Adsorbent

Abstract

This work newly employed monoclinic zirconia (ZrO2) as a promoter to improve CO2 pyrolysis of coffee waste (CW). The CO2 pyrolysis of CW presented the high level of CO production (14.3 mol%) during two stages of non-isothermal (280 to 700 °C) and isothermal pyrolysis (kept at 700 °C). At the same condition, the incorporation of ZrO2 improved the CO generation up to about twice that of CW (29.5 mol%) by possibly inducing more conversion of pyrolytic oil into gas. The characterization results exhibited that ZrO2-impregnated biochar (ZrB) possessed the distinctive surface morphology that highly graphitic- and porous carbon layers were covered by ZrO2 nanoparticle clusters. In a series of adsorption experiments, ZrB composite showed pH-dependent As(V) adsorption and pH neutralization ability. The adsorption proceeded relatively rapid with 95% removal during 120 min in the early stage, followed by 5% removal in the remaining 240 min. The maximum adsorption capacity was found to be 25.2 mg g-1 at final pH 8. The reusability and stability of ZrB were demonstrated in the 6 consecutive cycles of adsorption/desorption. As a result, ZrO2-assisted CO2 pyrolysis can potentially produce fuel gas with high CO fraction and composite adsorbent suitable for As(V) removal in acidic wastewater.