Base-rich diamino protic ionic liquid mixtures for enhanced CO2 capture

Energy Applications of Ionic Liquids: Recent Developments and Future Prospects

Ionic liquids (ILs) consisting entirely of ions exhibit many fascinating and tunable properties, making them promising functional materials for a large number of energy-related applications. For example, ILs have been employed as electrolytes for electrochemical energy storage and conversion, as heat transfer fluids and phase-change materials for thermal energy transfer and storage, as solvents and/or catalysts for CO2 capture, CO2 conversion, biomass treatment and biofuel extraction, and as high-energy propellants for aerospace applications. This paper provides an extensive overview on the various energy applications of ILs and offers some thinking and viewpoints on the current challenges and emerging opportunities in each area. The basic fundamentals (structures and properties) of ILs are first introduced. Then, motivations and successful applications of ILs in the energy field are concisely outlined. Later, a detailed review of recent representative works in each area is provided. For each application, the role of ILs and their associated benefits are elaborated. Research trends and insights into the selection of ILs to achieve improved performance are analyzed as well. Challenges and future opportunities are pointed out before the paper is concluded.

Experimental Investigation on Thermophysical Properties of Ammonium-Based Protic Ionic Liquids and Their Potential Ability towards CO2 Capture

Ionic liquids, which are extensively known as low-melting-point salts, have received significant attention as the promising solvent for CO₂ capture. This work presents the synthesis, thermophysical properties and the CO₂ absorption of a series of ammonium cations coupled with carboxylate anions producing ammonium-based protic ionic liquids (PILs), namely 2-ethylhexylammonium pentanoate ([EHA][C5]), 2-ethylhexylammonium hexanoate ([EHA][C6]), 2-ethylhexylammonium heptanoate ([EHA][C7]), bis-(2-ethylhexyl)ammonium pentanoate ([BEHA][C5]), bis-(2-ethylhexyl)ammonium hexanoate ([BEHA][C6]) and bis-(2-ethylhexyl)ammonium heptanoate ([BEHA][C7]). The chemical structures of the PILs were confirmed by using Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) spectroscopy while the density (ρ) and the dynamic viscosity (η) of the PILs were determined and analyzed in a range from 293.15K up to 363.15K. The refractive index (n_D) was also measured at T = (293.15 to 333.15) K. Thermal analyses conducted via a thermogravimetric analyzer (TGA) and differential scanning calorimeter (DSC) indicated that all PILs have the thermal decomposition temperature, T_d of greater than 416K and the presence of glass transition, T_g was detected in each PIL. The CO₂ absorption of the PILs was studied up to 29 bar at 298.15 K and the experimental results showed that [BEHA][C7] had the highest CO₂ absorption with 0.78 mol at 29 bar. The CO₂ absorption values increase in the order of [C5] < [C6] < [C7] anion regardless of the nature of the cation.

DFT Study on the Chemical Absorption Mechanism of CO2 in Diamino Protic Ionic Liquids

Diamino protic ionic liquids (DPILs) possess a wide application prospect in the field of acid gas absorption. In this work, two representative DPILs, that is, dimethylethylenediamine 4-fluorophenolate ([DMEDAH][4-F-PhO]) and dimethylethylenediamine acetate ([DMEDAH][OAc]), which had been proved to display favorable CO₂ absorption performance in experiments, were selected. Based on the solvation model, the different mechanisms of CO₂ absorption by [DMEDAH]⁺ cations combined with different anions were investigated using the dispersion-corrected density functional theory method. Above all, the possible active sites of the reaction between DPILs and CO₂ were analyzed by electrostatic potential (ESP) and electronegativity, and the transition states in each path were searched and verified by frequency calculation and intrinsic reaction coordinate calculation. Furthermore, the Gibbs free energy and reaction heat of each path were calculated, and the free energy barrier and enthalpy barrier diagrams were shown. It was found that the absorption path by the anion of [DMEDAH][4-F-PhO] was favorable in kinetics, while the absorption path by the cation was thermodynamically beneficial. In addition, [DMEDAH][OAc] only showed the possibility of cation absorption, and the mechanism of the transfer of active protons to weak acid anions and the formation of acetic acid molecules was more favorable. Moreover, through the structural analysis, bond order and bond energy calculation, ESP analysis of the ion pair absorption configuration, and comparison with the products of CO₂ absorbed by isolated ions, it was found that the interaction between anions/cations and CO₂ could weaken or enhance the interaction between anions and cations in different reaction steps. Hopefully, this study is helpful to understand the absorption mechanism of CO₂ by DPILs and provides a theoretical basis for the R&D of multi-active site functionalized ILs.

Ionic Liquids/Deep Eutectic Solvents-Based Hybrid Solvents for CO2 Capture

The CO2 solubilities (including CO2 Henry’s constants) and viscosities in ionic liquids (ILs)/deep eutectic solvents (DESs)-based hybrid solvents were comprehensively collected and summarized. The literature survey results of CO2 solubility illustrated that the addition of hybrid solvents to ILs/DESs can significantly enhance the CO2 solubility, and some of the ILs-based hybrid solvents are super to DESs-based hybrid solvents. The best hybrid solvents of IL–H2O, IL–organic, IL–amine, DES–H2O, and DES–organic are [DMAPAH][Formate] (2.5:1) + H2O (20 wt %) (4.61 mol/kg, 298 K, 0.1 MPa), [P4444][Pro] + PEG400 (70 wt %) (1.61 mol/kg, 333.15 K, 1.68 MPa), [DMAPAH][Formate] (2.0:1) + MEA (30 wt %) (6.24 mol/kg, 298 K, 0.1 MPa), [TEMA][Cl]-GLY-H2O 1:2:0.11 (0.66 mol/kg, 298 K, 1.74 MPa), and [Ch][Cl]-MEA 1:2 + DBN 1:1 (5.11 mol/kg, 298 K, 0.1 MPa), respectively. All of these best candidates show higher CO2 solubility than their used pure ILs or DESs, evidencing that IL/DES-based hybrid solvents are remarkable for CO2 capture. For the summarized viscosity results, the presence of hybrid solvents in ILs and DESs can decrease their viscosities. The lowest viscosities acquired in this work for IL–H2O, IL–amine, DES–H2O, and DES–organic hybrid solvents are [DEA][Bu] + H2O (98.78 mol%) (0.59 mPa·s, 343.15 K), [BMIM][BF4] + DETA (94.9 mol%) (2.68 mPa·s, 333.15 K), [L-Arg]-GLY 1:6 + H2O (60 wt %) (2.7 mPa·s, 353.15 K), and [MTPP][Br]-LEV-Ac 1:3:0.03 (16.16 mPa·s, 333.15 K) at 0.1 MPa, respectively.

Surface-Response Analysis for the Optimization of a Carbon Dioxide Absorption Process Using [hmim][Tf2N]

The [hmim][Tf2N] ionic liquid is considered in this work to develop a model in Aspen Plus® capturing carbon dioxide from shifted flue gas through physical absorption. Ionic liquids are innovative and promising green solvents for the capture of carbon dioxide. As an important aspect of this research, optimization is carried out for the carbon capture system through a central composite design: simulation and statistical analysis are combined together. This leads to important results such as the identification of significant factors and their combinations. Surface plots and mathematical models are developed for capital costs, operating costs and removal of carbon dioxide. These models can be used to find optimal operating conditions maximizing the amount of captured carbon dioxide and minimizing total costs: the percentage of carbon dioxide removal is 93.7%, operating costs are 0.66 million €/tonCO2 captured (due to the high costs of ionic liquid), and capital costs are 52.2 €/tonCO2 captured.

Thermophysical Properties and CO2 Absorption of Ammonium-Based Protic Ionic Liquids Containing Acetate and Butyrate Anions

Ionic liquids, which are classified as new solvents, have been identified to be potential solvents in the application of CO2 capture. In this work, six ammonium-based protic ionic liquids, containing ethanolammonium [EtOHA], tributylammonium [TBA], bis(2-ethylhexyl)ammonium [BEHA] cations, and acetate [AC] and butyrate [BA] anions, were synthesized and characterized. The thermophysical properties of the ammonium-based protic ionic liquids were measured. Density, , and dynamic viscosity, , were determined at temperatures between 293.15 K and 363.15 K. The density and viscosity values were correlated using empirical correlations and the thermal coefficient expansion, p, and molecular volume, Vm, were estimated using density values. The thermal stability of the ammonium-based protic ionic liquids was investigated using thermogravimetric analyzer (TGA) at a heating rate of 10 C.min‒1. The CO2 absorption of the ammonium-based ionic liquids were measured up to 20 bar at 298.15 K. From the experimental results, [BEHA][BA] had the highest affinity towards CO2 with the mol fraction of CO2 absorbed approaching 0.5 at 20 bar. Generally, ionic liquids with butyrate anions have better CO2 absorption than that of acetate anions while [BEHA] ionic liquids have higher affinity towards CO2 followed by [TBA] and [EtOHA] ionic liquids.

High throughput approach to investigating ternary solvents of aqueous non-stoichiometric protic ionic liquids

The use of ionic liquids (ILs) is limited for many applications due to their cost and/or viscosity. An efficient solution is to make mixtures of ILs with molecular solvents. However, it is well known that there are a large number of possible cation and anion combinations resulting in ILs, and this becomes a vast number when these are then combined with a molecular solvent. Therefore, we need structure-property relationships to design new IL-molecular solvent systems. In this work we have applied high throughput methods to investigate IL containing solutions to provide systematic data of a broad compositional space. We have principally focused on the surface tension, apparent pH and liquid nanostructure to identify potential self-assembly and protein stabilizing ability of solvent systems. Non-stoichiometric and aqueous IL-solvents were prepared in a high-throughput manner based on a deliberate experimental design approach such that 26 samples were prepared for each cation-anion-water combination. A selection of 8 protic ionic liquids (PILs) were used as starting materials, comprising ethanol-, ethyl-, butyl-, and pentylammonium cations combined with formate, acetate and nitrate anions. This resulted in a total of 208 different solvent systems. The measured solvent properties showed different trends in base-rich and acid-rich solvent combinations. Surface tensions of base-rich samples exhibited a relatively linear relationship with increasing excess amine, while acid-rich samples were more dominantly affected by the change in water content. Liquid nanostructure of acid-rich samples was retained upon water dilution, whereas a significant SAXS peak shift towards lower scattering angles was observed in the presence of excess amines, indicating larger nanosized aggregates were forming. The design of experiment approach used here is considered to be applicable to any multi-component solvent compositional space due to its suitability in using small data sets to cover large compositional spaces, and hence can be employed to decrease the time and sample quantities required.

High CO2 absorption by diamino protic ionic liquids using azolide anions

Highly efficient low-viscosity protic ionic liquids with enhanced CO₂ absorption capacities exhibiting more than 20% w/w uptake.