Studies on activated carbon mixed with CaO for CO2 adsorption

Carbon dioxide emission as part of the greenhouse effect had been the biggest hurdle to the continuity of humankind. Thus, CO2 adsorption and storage have been considered as one of the solutions to this biggest problem of 20th century. CaO and activated carbon are widely known as the best material for CO2 adsorption. This study used these two materials and determine if the combination of the materials will improve the adsorption capability. Activated carbon mixed with various concentration of CaO (10%, 20%, 30%, 40% and 50%) was prepared using wet impregnation method and calcined in 99.9% N2 at 850 °C for 1 hour. The samples were next characterized using X-Ray Diffraction (XRD) to determine crystallinity and N2 adsorption-desorption for analyzing surface area of the samples. Adsorption and desorption behavior of CO2 adsorption was determined using CO2-Temperature Programmed Desorption (TPD). N2 adsorption-desorption analysis had shown that samples surface area ranging from 126.7 m2 g−1 to 449.3 m2 g−1. XRD had also shown increasing intensity of peak CaO and Ca(OH)2 following the increasing amount of CaO mixed with activated carbon. 30% CaO mixed with activated carbon has shown the highest amount of CO2 desorbed in the TPD profile. At this level, we expected some physical-chemical interaction between CaO and activated carbon used in this study.