CO 2 Absorption Performance of “Dry Matter” Prepared with Amino Acid-Based Ionic Liquids

Dry Matter (DM) is a powdery substance which is composed of micro droplets and surrounding hydrophobic silica nanoparticles. Because of the much larger surface area than that of the corresponding bulk liquid, DM, which contains amino-functionalized ionic liquids (ILs), is a promising CO2 absorption material provided with quick absorption speed. In the present study, we successfully prepared powdery DMs by utilizing aqueous solutions of amino acid-based ILs (tetraethylammonium glycine [N2222][Gly], and tetraethylammonium alanine [N2222][Ala]). Although a DM with lysine-based IL (N2222) [Lys]) was also prepared, only a souffle-like material was obtained. We measured CO2 absorption performance for the DMs to find that the mass-base absorption ability (mass-base A.A.) (CO2 mol/DM kg) and the mol-base one (CO2 mol/IL mol) of [N2222][Lys] were ca. two times of [N2222][Gly] and [N2222][Ala], while the absorption speed of the former was inferior to the latter two, i.e., ca.15 min vs. 5 min for 90% absorption. In order to improve the mass-base A.A. of [N2222][Gly], we used 10% of aqueous poly(allylamine) (PAlAm) solution instead of water. The resultant mass-base A.A. proved to be significantly larger (1.9) than either of those of the respective single component systems (1.1 and 0.75 for the bulk IL and aq. PAlAm, respectively), and comparable to the A.A. (1.6 - 2.5) of 20% - 30% monoethanolamine solution which is commonly used in industrial application.