Meso-macroporous polymer densely functionalized with tertiary amine groups as effective sorbents for SO2 capture

Abstract Developing new technologies for the reduction of SO2 emission is highly demanded. In this work, a meso-macroporous polymer was synthesized by one-step solvothermal polymerization of divinylbenzene (DVB). The synthesized polymer-polydivinylbenzene (PDVB) also has considerably large pore volume. Given these features, a series of composite sorbents with a polytertiary amine (PTA) physically immobilized in PDVB were then synthesized, and subsequently characterized and investigated for the capture of SO2 in details. The PTA loadings of composite sorbents range from 1.00 to 2.35 g/g, which are dense in the functionalization of tertiary amine groups that enable Lewis base-acid interaction with SO2. As a result, the composite sorbents exhibit excellent efficiency for SO2 capture, especially at extremely low pressures. The SO2 adsorption capacities of composite sorbents have the values of 3.86 ~ 6.88 mmol/g of SO2 at 25 °C and 0.002 bar. The composite sorbents are also excellent for the selective separation of SO2 from CO2 and N2, as well as the excellent reversibility for the adsorption of SO2.