A review on the effect of amination pretreatment for the selective separation of CO₂

For the cost-effective control of unregulated CO₂ emissions, its capture through modifications to adsorbents has recently gained much attention. In this respect, amination through basification of activated carbon (AC) surface is one of the practical approaches to separate CO₂. To learn more about such mechanism, a number of key variables (e.g., the nature of the AC surface groups, their CO₂ absorption enthalpy, and the effect of amination on adsorption) are reviewed. The potent role of amination is hence described with respect to the significance of pretreatment prior to amination technique by comparing the performance of diverse media (e.g., advanced oxidation processes (AOP), Ca(NO₃)₂, and KOH) for such application. The analysis of collected adsorption data suggests that the efficiency of amination and eventual selective adsorption of CO₂ can be improved by such pretreatment as KOH sintering in terms of inducing stronger surface CO₂ binding energy.