SAPO-34 Nanoparticles for CO2 Capture: Optimization of Synthesis Parameters

Carbon dioxide is one of major greenhouse gaseous that lead to global warming.
Besides, removing carbon dioxide has become a major key mostly in natural gas
industry as carbon dioxide can reduce the heating value and energy content of the gas
as well as corrosive in presence of water. Due to that, various technologies have been
developed for CO2 removal including amine absorption, membrane separation and
adsorption. Adsorption is the most preferential technology mainly attributed to its
ease of availability and economic efficiency. Literature showed that SAPO-34 has
great potential in CO2 adsorption as it has high selectivity of CO2/CH4 separation.
However, synthesis of SAPO-34 nanoparticles is still a major concern in order to
reduce the size of the particles and increase the CO2 adsorption capability while
retaining the morphology of the crystals. Therefore, this research work is focuses on
the synthesis of SAPO-34 nanoparticles by using sonochemical treatment prior to
synthesis. The synthesis parameters including ultrasonic pretreatment duration and
synthesis time were varied and optimized using Design Expert software. The
resulting particles characterized using TEM and FTIR shows that increasing in
hydrothermal heating duration will increase the particle size of SAPO-34 and
crystallinity. Meanwhile, surface area of SAPO-34 nanoparticles increased as the
particle size decreases. The CO2 adsorption characteristics of the resulting particles
were tested using BELSORP. The effect of particle size on CO2 adsorption was
extensively studied and analyzed using Design Expert Software.