Engineered Porous Nanocomposites That Deliver Remarkably Low Carbon Capture Energy Costs

A key barrier to the use of carbon dioxide capture technologies is the operating energy requirement, the chief contributor being the energy required to regenerate the capture media. When paired with electricity generation, the parasitic energy load can prohibit implementation. While metal organic frameworks (MOFs) harbor significant adsorption capacities, their thermally insulating nature will require significant energy and time to regenerate. Here, we report a MOF nanocomposite that can be regenerated at high speed and low energy cost. An adsorption system is tailored to deliver a very low energy cost of only 1.29 MJ kg−1CO2, 45% below commercially deployed materials, which can be exploited to deliver a productivity as high as 3.13 kgCO2 h−1 kgAds−1. The combination of a MOF (Mg-MOF-74) with high adsorption capacity, a magnetic nanoparticle (MgFe2O4), and a porous hydrophobic polymer results in a composite that can be used in the magnetic induction swing adsorption (MISA) process.