Grant: Discovery Grants Program - Individual

This proposal will focus on three projects: 1) Gas separations by using adsorption for production of renewable natural gas from landfill gas 2) Capturing carbon dioxide (CO2) from combustion gases using membranes 2) Application of the adsorption technology for thermal energy storage.    The first project will focus on adsorbent screening for the production of renewable natural gas from landfill gas that is produced from garbage. If we can produce natural gas, which is composed of mostly methane (CH4) from garbage, we will increase the sustainability of our society. Landfill gas is composed of mostly CH4 and CO2 gases with a small amount of nitrogen (N2). If we can remove CO2 and N2 from CH4, we can produce natural gas to be used as fuel. Therefore, we will study the separation of these gases by adsorption. Pure and mixture adsorption isotherms will be determined experimentally for different adsorbents. Mechanistic models will be developed and verified with experimental breakthrough curves for the more promising adsorbents. 1 PhD student and 1 undergraduate COOP student will work on this project every year.    The second project will focus on the use of different mixed matrix membranes (MMM) to capture CO2 from combustion gases for it to be used for the production of synthetic fuels or valuable other chemicals. Combustion gases are composed of about 15 % CO2, with the rest mostly N2 after water, NOx and SOx are removed. After its capture, CO2 can be reacted with hydrogen (H2) to produce carbon monoxide (CO), which can be used as a raw material to produce fuels or valuable chemicals. Membrane separation of CO2, N2, CO and H2 gases will be studied under different humidity conditions. Separation characteristics of membranes containing adsorbent materials and polymers in the MMM's structure will be determined at different operating conditions, as well as at different fractions of adsorbents and polymers in the MMM structure. 1 PhD student and 1 undergraduate COOP student will work on this project every year.   The third project will focus on the use of exothermic adsorption of moisture from air for thermal energy storage for space heating applications. Thermal energy source could be solar or waste heat. Different adsorbent materials will be tried for this project. These adsorbent materials will include off the shelf commercial adsorbents, their modified versions, as well as adsorbents that will be prepared in house. Mechanistic models will be developed and verified with experimental breakthrough curves for the system. This type of thermal energy storage has a lot of advantages such as not requiring nasty chemicals and having energy storage capability for a long time. 1 PhD student and 1 undergraduate COOP student will work on this project every year.    The results of these projects will all improve our fundamental knowledge and the sustainability of our society.