Experimental study of pure and mixtures of CO2 and CH4 adsorption on modified carbon nanotubes

In this work 3-[2-(2-aminoethylamino)ethylamino]propyl trimethoxysilane (TRI) was employed to functionalize MWCNT containing hydroxyl groups (OH-MWCNT), and the XRD, FTIR, TGA and CHNS elemental analysis techniques were used to characterize the resulted adsorbents. The characterization results for amine-MWCNT showed amine groups effectively attached to the surface of the MWCNT. The equilibrium adsorption capacity of pure CO2 and CH4 and their binary mixture on the pristine MWCNT, OH-MWCNT and amine-MWCNT was measured through a set of equilibrium adsorption experiments at 303.2 and 318.2 K. Capacities of all three types of adsorbents for CO2 adsorption were higher than those for methane adsorption. Also, amine-MWCNT demonstrated better performance on CO2 adsorption than the other two adsorbents, especially at low partial pressures. The capacity of amine-MWCNT for pure CO2 adsorption was 2.5 and 4 times as much as those for pristine MWCNT and OH-MWCNT, respectively, at the temperature of 303.2 K and the pressure of 0.2 bar. The binary adsorption experiment revealed that CO2/CH4 selectivity for pristine MWCNT and amine-MWCNT in all molar fractions of CO2 is about 1.77 and 7, respectively.