Synthesis and characterization of MOFs/activated carbon composite on carbon-dioxide adsorption

Industrial development has impact to the production of carbon dioxide gas emissions, particularly resulted from combustion exhaust gases in production process. Almost 90% of the gases that cause the greenhouse effect is produced by the increasing of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Porous material is one the promising adsorbent material for inorganic elements, such as carbon dioxide gas. The activated carbon used in this study was produced from seaweed solid waste. A high cellulose composition in seaweed solid waste, which reached 43.47%, making the seaweed solid waste has potency to be a precursor of activated carbon. Many research developments to improve the performance of activated carbon as an adsorbent have been carried out. One of the most promising groups of adsorbents for carbon dioxide capture are metal organic frameworks (MOFs) as microporous materials with crystal structures. The purpose of this study is to create a new type of composite using the activated carbon derived from seaweed solid waste and Metal Organic Frameworks (MOFs) to enhance the adsorption capacity of carbon dioxide gas. Activated carbon was carried out using carbonization process in temperature of 4000C for 60 minutes and 6000C for 30 minutes. Then bio-chars were activated using NaOH solution with concentration of 40% and 20%. Copper and Nickel as metals in MOF were selected in this study. The MOFs/AC composite were investigated to find out their porosity and surface area using BET analyzer, and the potency to adsorp carbon dioxide gas using Temperatur Programme Desorption (TPD)-CO2. The compositon of metals were measured using an X-Ray Fluorescence (XRF). The composite material of MOF with activated carbon resulted higher CO2 adsorption capacity than activated carbon produced by chemical activation using NaOH solution. The presence of collaborative or cooperative effects originating from different components can increase the adsorption capacity of CO2 molecules because an active site is formed on the surface between Cu-MOFs and Ni-MOFs with activated carbon.