Efficient CO2 Adsorption on Nitrogen-Doped Porous Carbons Derived from d-Glucose

The synthesis of carbonaceous CO2 adsorbents doped with nitrogen were carried out via a hydrothermal reaction of biomass d-glucose, followed by urea treatment and K2CO3 activation. These carbons display high uptake of CO2 at 1 bar and 25 and 0 °C, up to 3.92 and 6.23 mmol g–1, respectively. Additionally, the as-synthesized materials exhibit superior reusability, high CO2/N2 selectivity, fast CO2 adsorption kinetics, and excellent dynamic capture capacity at the experimental conditions used. The synthetic effect of the nitrogen content and narrow microporosity decide the capture capacity for CO2 at 1 bar and 25 °C for these N-enriched carbonaceous adsorbents. This study provides a viable method to prepare high-performance CO2 carbonaceous sorbents without using caustic KOH. In addition, this work gives further insights into the CO2 adsorption mechanism for nitrogen-doped porous carbon sorbents and, hence, inspires ways to synthesize novel carbonaceous materials for removing CO2 from combustion exhaust gases.