Methane adsorption microcalorimetry by activated carbon fibre derived from empty fruit bunch fibre
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Date
2015-10-01
Authors
Lee Ting
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Abstract
Empty fruit bunch (EFB) fibre of oil palm is anagricultural waste available abundantly from palm oil processing industry. In present work, EFB fibre was utilised as a precursorfor preparation of activated carbon fibre (ACF) as an adsorbent for adsorbed natural gas (ANG) application. The ACFs were produced via carbonisation, followed by physicochemical and activation. Physicohemical activation was carried out using sulphuric acid treatment followed by CO2 gas flow. The effects of different combustion and pyrolysis temperatures on the prepared ACFs were analysed. In addition, the effect of acid treatment on EFB fibres was further studied by switching the sequence of acid treatment before and after combustion and pyrolysis. Intercalation and exfoliation reactions on the acid-treated EFB fibre due to sulphuric acid resulted in a higher thermal degradation rate compared to raw EFB fibre without acid treatment. The highest BET surface area and total pore volume obtained amongst the ACF samples treated with acidwas found to achievevalues as high as 1049 m2/g and 0.45 cm3/g, respectively, after optimisation of the processing parameter. ACF exhibited predominantly micropore with pore width of 1.2 nm, which fulfil one of the requirements as an ideal adsorbent for ANG application.The maximum volumetric methane adsorption by the ACFs was observed to be 136 V/V at practical ANG conditions; viz. 298 K and 3.5 MPa. The volumetric storage capacities of these ACFs were comparable to the adsorptioncapacities of selected carbon materialscommercially available in the market, which are mainly derived
from petroleum products after rationalising with packing density. Low deterioration in methane storage performance from subsequent adsorption cyclic operation indicated that the EFB fibre-derived ACF has good reusability, which is suitable for ANG application.