A comparative study of N2O conversion to N-2 over Co/AC and Cu/AC catalysts

Catalytic conversion of N2O to N-2 over Cu- and Co-impregnated activated carbon catalysts (Cu/AC and Co/AC) was investigated. Catalytic activity measurements were carried out in a fixed-bed flow reactor at atmospheric pressure. The catalysts were characterized by N-2 adsorption, X-ray diffraction (XRD) and thermogravimetric analysis (TGA). This study aimed to provide insights into the following aspects: the metal dispersion, changes in pore structure, influence of catalyst loading on reaction, and reaction mechanism. Increasing loading of Co or Cu led to decreasing dispersion, but 20 wt % loading was an upper limit for optimal activities in both cases, with too high loading causing sintering of metal. Co exhibited a relatively better dispersion than Cu. Impregnation of metal led to a large decrease in surface area and pore volume, especially for 30 wt % of loading. 20 wt % of loading has proved to be the optimum for both Cu and Co, which shows the highest activity. Both N2O-Co/AC and -Cu/AC reactions are based upon a redox mechanism, but the former is limited by the oxygen transfer from catalysts to carbon, while N2O chemisorption on the surface of Cu catalyst controls the latter. The removal of oxygen from cobalt promotes the activity of Co/AC, but it is beneficial for Cu/AC to keep plenty of oxygen to maintain the intermediate oxidation of copper-Cu1+. The different nature of the two catalysts and their catalytic reaction mechanisms are closely related to their different electronegativities.

Characterization of micro-mesoporous carbonaceous materials. Calculations of adsorption isotherm of hydrocarbons

In this paper we apply a method recently developed by Do and co-workers(1) for the prediction of adsorption isotherms of pure vapors on carbonaceous materials. The information required for the prediction is the pore size distribution and the BET constant, C, of a corresponding nonporous surface (graphite). The dispersive adsorption force is assumed to be the dominant force in adsorption mechanism. This applies to nonpolar and weakly polar hydrocarbons. We test this predictive model against the adsorption data of benzene, toluene, n-pentane, n-hexane, and ethanol on a commercial activated carbon. It is found that the predictions are excellent for all adsorbates tested with the exception of ethanol where the predicted values are about 10% less than the experimental data, and this is probably attributed to the electrostatic interaction between ethanol molecules and the functional groups on the carbon surfaces.

Adsorption of aromatic compounds by activated carbon: Effects of functional groups and molecular size

The adsorption of three aromatic compounds on to an untreated carbon was investigated. The solution pH was lowered in all experiments so that all the solutes were in their molecular forms. It was shown that the difference in the maximum adsorption of the solutes was mainly a result of the difference in the sizes of the molecules and their functional groups. Further-more, it was illustrated that the packing arrangement was most likely edge-to-face (sorbate-sorbent) with various tilt angles. On the other hand, the affinity and heterogeneity of the adsorption systems were apparently related to the pK(a) values of the solutes.

Application of density functional theory to equilibrium adsorption of argon and nitrogen on amorphous silica surface

We present a new version of non-local density functional theory (NL-DFT) adapted to description of vapor adsorption isotherms on amorphous materials like non-porous silica. The novel feature of this approach is that it accounts for the roughness of adsorbent surface. The solid–fluid interaction is described in the same framework as in the case of fluid–fluid interactions, using the Weeks–Chandler–Andersen (WCA) scheme and the Carnahan–Starling (CS) equation for attractive and repulsive parts of the Helmholtz free energy, respectively. Application to nitrogen and argon adsorption isotherms on non-porous silica LiChrospher Si-1000 at their boiling points, recently published by Jaroniec and co-workers, has shown an excellent correlative ability of our approach over the complete range of pressures, which suggests that the surface roughness is mostly the reason for the observed behavior of adsorption isotherms. From the analysis of these data, we found that in the case of nitrogen adsorption short-range interactions between oxygen atoms on the silica surface and quadrupole of nitrogen molecules play an important role. The approach presented in this paper may be further used in quantitative analysis of adsorption and desorption isotherms in cylindrical pores such as MCM-41 and carbon nanotubes.

Impact of potential models on adsorption of linear molecules on carbon black

In this paper, we investigate the effects of potential models on the description of equilibria of linear molecules (ethylene and ethane) adsorption on graphitized thermal carbon black. GCMC simulation is used as a tool to give adsorption isotherms, isosteric heat of adsorption and the microscopic configurations of these molecules. At the heart of the GCMC are the potential models, describing fluid-fluid interaction and solid-fluid interaction. Here we studied the two potential models recently proposed in the literature, the UA-TraPPE and AUA4. Their impact in the description of adsorption behavior of pure components will be discussed. Mixtures of these components with nitrogen and argon are also studied. Nitrogen is modeled a two-site plus discrete charges while argon as a spherical particle. GCMC simulation is also used for generating simulation mixture isotherms. It is found that co-operation between species occurs when the surface is fractionally covered while competition is important when surface is fully loaded.

Adsorption of quadrupolar, diatomic nitrogen onto graphitized thermal carbon black and in slit-shaped carbon pores. Effects of surface mediation

In this paper, we study the effect of solid surface mediation on the intermolecular potential energy of nitrogen, and its impact on the adsorption of nitrogen on a graphitized carbon black surface and in carbon slit-shaped pores. This effect arises from the lower effective interaction potential energy between two particles close to the surface compared to the potential energy of the same two particles when they are far away from the surface. A simple equation is proposed to calculate the reduction factor and this is used in the Grand Canonical Monte Carlo (GCMC) simulation of nitrogen adsorption on graphitized thermal carbon black. With this modification, the GCMC simulation results agree extremely well with the experimental data over a wide range of pressure; the simulation results with the original potential energy (i.e. no surface mediation) give rise to a shoulder in the neighbourhood of monolayer coverage and a significant over-prediction of the second and higher layer coverages. The influence of this surface mediation on the dependence of the pore-filling pressure on the pore width is also studied. It is shown that such surface mediation has a significant effect on the pore-filling pressure. This implies that the use of the local isotherms obtained from the potential model without surface mediation could give rise to a serious error in the determination of the pore-size distribution.

Cooperative and competitive adsorption of ethylene, ethane, nitrogen and argon on graphitized carbon black and in slit pores

In this paper we investigate the mixture adsorption of ethylene, ethane, nitrogen and argon on graphitized thermal carbon black and in slit pores by means of the Grand Canonical Monte Carlo simulations. Pure component adsorption isotherms on graphitized thermal carbon black are first characterized with the GCMC method, and then mixture simulations are carried out over a wide range of pore width, temperature, pressure and composition to investigate the cooperative and competitive adsorption of all species in the mixture. Results of mixture simulations are compared with the experimental data of ethylene and ethane (Friederich and Mullins, 1972) on Sterling FTG-D5 (homogeneous carbon black having a BET surface area of 13 m(2)/g) at 298 K and a pressure range of 1.3-93 kPa. Because of the co-operative effect, the Henry constant determined by the traditional chromatography method is always greater than that obtained from the volumetric method.

Polymeric grafting of acrylic acid onto poly(3-hydroxybutyrate-co-3-hydroxyvalerate): Surface functionalization for tissue engineering applications

Poly(3-hydroxybutyrate-co-3-hydroxyvalerate) (PHBV) melt processed disks and solvent cast films were modified by graft co-polyinerization with acrylic acid (AAc) in methanol solution at ambient temperature using gamma irradiation (dose rate of 4.5 kGy/h). To assess the presence of carboxylic acid groups on the surface, reaction with pentafluorophenol was performed prior to X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy analysis. The grafting yield for all samples increased with monomer concentration (2-15%), and for the solvent cast films, it also increased with dose (2-9 kGy). However, the grafting yield of the melt processed disks was largely independent of the radiation dose (2-8 kGy). Toluidine blue was used to stain the modified materials facilitating, visual information about the extent of carboxylic acid functionalization and depth penetration of the grafted copolymer. Covalent linking of glucosamine to the functionalized surface was achieved using carbodimide chemistry verifying that the modified substrates are suitable for biomolecule attachment.

Adsorption in slit pores and pore-size distribution: A molecular layer structure theory

A new approach is developed to analyze the thermodynamic properties of a sub-critical fluid adsorbed in a slit pore of activated carbon. The approach is based on a representation that an adsorbed fluid forms an ordered structure close to a smoothed solid surface. This ordered structure is modelled as a collection of parallel molecular layers. Such a structure allows us to express the Helmholtz free energy of a molecular layer as the sum of the intrinsic Helmholtz free energy specific to that layer and the potential energy of interaction of that layer with all other layers and the solid surface. The intrinsic Helmholtz free energy of a molecular layer is a function (at given temperature) of its two-dimensional density and it can be readily obtained from bulk-phase properties, while the interlayer potential energy interaction is determined by using the 10-4 Lennard-Jones potential. The positions of all layers close to the graphite surface or in a slit pore are considered to correspond to the minimum of the potential energy of the system. This model has led to accurate predictions of nitrogen and argon adsorption on carbon black at their normal boiling points. In the case of adsorption in slit pores, local isotherms are determined from the minimization of the grand potential. The model provides a reasonable description of the 0-1 monolayer transition, phase transition and packing effect. The adsorption of nitrogen at 77.35 K and argon at 87.29 K on activated carbons is analyzed to illustrate the potential of this theory, and the derived pore-size distribution is compared favourably with that obtained by the Density Functional Theory (DFT). The model is less time-consuming than methods such as the DFT and Monte-Carlo simulation, and most importantly it can be readily extended to the adsorption of mixtures and capillary condensation phenomena.

Effects of graphene layer size on the adsorption of fluids on graphitized thermal carbon black. A computer simulation study

The adsorption of Lennard-Jones fluids (argon and nitrogen) onto a graphitized thermal carbon black surface was studied with a Grand Canonical Monte Carlo Simulation (GCMC). The surface was assumed to be finite in length and composed of three graphene layers. When the GCMC simulation was used to describe adsorption on a graphite surface, an over-prediction of the isotherm was consistently observed in the pressure regions where the first and second layers are formed. To remove this over-prediction, surface mediation was accounted for to reduce the fluid-fluid interaction. Do and co-workers have introduced the so-called surface-mediation damping factor to correct the over-prediction for the case of a graphite surface of infinite extent, and this approach has yielded a good description of the adsorption isotherm. In this paper, the effects of the finite size of the graphene layer on the adsorption isotherm and how these would affect the extent of the surface mediation were studied. It was found that this finite-surface model provides a better description of the experimental data for graphitized thermal carbon black of high surface area (i.e. small crystallite size) while the infinite- surface model describes data for carbon black of very low surface area (i.e. large crystallite size).

Molecular sieve silica membranes for H2/CO separation

Efficient separation of fuel gas (H2) from other gases in reformed gas mixtures is becoming increasingly important in the development of alternative energy systems. A highly efficient and new technology available for these separations is molecular sieve silica (MSS) membranes derived from tetraethyl-orthosilicate (TEOS). A permeation model is developed from an analogous electronic system and compared to transport theory to determine permeation, selectivity and apparent activation of energy based on experimental values. Experimental results for high quality membranes show single gas permselectivity peaking at 57 for H2/CO at 150°C with a H2 permeation of 5.14 x 10^-8 mol.m^-2.s^-1.Pa^-1. Higher permeance was also achieved, but at the expense of selectivity. This is the case for low quality membranes with peak H2 permeation at 1.78 x 10-7 mol.m-2.s-1.Pa-1 at 22°C and H2/CO permselectivity of 4.5. High quality membranes are characterised with positive apparent activation energy while the low quality membranes have negative values. The model had a good fit of r-squared of 0.99-1.00 using the experimental data.

Hydrostability and Scaling Up Molecular Sieve Silica (MSS) Membranes for H2/CO Separation in Fuel Cell Systems

MSS membranes are a good candidate for CO cleanup in fuel cell fuel processing systems due to their ability to selectively permeate H2 over CO via molecular sieving. Successfully scaled up tubular membranes were stable under dry conditions to 400°C with H2 permeance as high as 2 x 10-6 mol.m-2.s^-1.Pa^-1 at 200 degrees C and H2/CO selectivity up to 6.4, indicating molecular sieving was the dominant mechanism. A novel carbonised template molecular sieve silica (CTMSS) technology gave the scaled up membranes resilience in hydrothermal conditions up to 400 degrees C in 34% steam and synthetic reformate, which is required for use in fuel cell CO cleanup systems.

A wavelet-based adaptive technique for adsorption problems involving steep gradients

A general, fast wavelet-based adaptive collocation method is formulated for heat and mass transfer problems involving a steep moving profile of the dependent variable. The technique of grid adaptation is based on sparse point representation (SPR). The method is applied and tested for the case of a gas–solid non-catalytic reaction in a porous solid at high Thiele modulus. Accurate and convergent steep profiles are obtained for Thiele modulus as large as 100 for the case of slab and found to match the analytical solution.

Computationally efficient solution techniques for adsorption problems involving steep gradients in bidisperse particles

A piecewise uniform fitted mesh method turns out to be sufficient for the solution of a surprisingly wide variety of singularly perturbed problems involving steep gradients. The technique is applied to a model of adsorption in bidisperse solids for which two fitted mesh techniques, a fitted-mesh finite difference method (FMFDM) and fitted mesh collocation method (FMCM) are presented. A combination (FMCMD) of FMCM and the DASSL integration package is found to be most effective in solving the problems. Numerical solutions (FMFDM and FMCMD) were found to match the analytical solution when the adsorption isotherm is linear, even under conditions involving steep gradients for which global collocation fails. In particular, FMCMD is highly efficient for macropore diffusion control or micropore diffusion control. These techniques are simple and there is no limit on the range of the parameters. The techniques can be applied to a variety of adsorption and desorption problems in bidisperse solids with non-linear isotherm and for arbitrary particle geometry.