Project background (identification of the problem and its importance and relevance to sustainability)
As one will be aware, increasing global temperatures and climate change are at the forefront of global and governmental policies to slow the production of pollutant gases. The focused culprit in many new schemes to tackle climate change is CO2, this causes the so called "Greenhouse" gas affect, trapping heat within our atmosphere, increasing global temperatures. Moreover, the greenhouse gas affect is not the only side effect of increased CO2 production, with increased levels of CO2 within the atmosphere this can affect the pH of sea water; this can have drastic effects on delicate ecosystems such as coral reefs. For many years CO2 has been emitted in large quantities with no regulation or care for our planet, but only within the last decade(s) has money been inputted into technologies and research to stop CO2 production, to entrap and store CO2 and to convert CO2 into useful products. By increasing research output for CO2 sequestration, this increases the speed at which we can tackle the climate crisis. Therefore, by implementing new and emerging, this will allow for preservation of precious materials and reduced CO2 production.
Proposed solution and methodology
Tackling CO2 concentration within the atmosphere is of upmost importance, hereby the proposed solution is electrocatalytic conversion of CO2 using functionalised carbon nanotube structures with ionic liquids and metal nanoparticles. The excellent conductivity of carbon nanotubes is well documented as well as ionic conductivity of ionic liquids alike, as such a composite material of the two coupled with metal nanoparticles for specific conversion of CO2 to useful products will allow for a broad overview of the system and its viability. Ionic liquids will be chosen based on the interaction strengths with CO2. I propose that increasing the aromatic groups within the ionic liquid will dramatically increase the absorption or uptake of CO2; all the while not utilising fluorine containing ionic liquids, although these have shown excellent CO2 uptake properties, production of hydrofluoric acid to functionalise these materials is highly polluting and must be avoided to not produce extremely harmful materials that could potentially be released into the environment. Also, by increasing aromatic groups within the ionic liquid, this also allows for further pi-pi stacking between the ionic liquid and carbon nanotube, which could allow for surface fictionalised nanotubes as well as internally trapped ionic liquids; potentially providing two pathways CO2 could follow. Therefore, it is proposed that by utilising magnetron sputtering a known metal loading can be achieved and with further analysis (TEM) leading to the locating of these metal cluster sites and if the desired material is formed. Lastly, all ionic liquids will be prepared using Schlenk techniques to ensure a purified material, with no unwanted compounds within the ionic liquid to ensure no side reactions occur within electrochemical cell. Furthermore, present technologies utilise precious metals, that are quickly being depleted through overuse or scarcity on out planet, I plan to use a naturally abundant metal (copper), this has shown to effectively activate CO2 and has been shown to produce desirable products such as methanol over less desirable compounds. By utilising this system in electrocatalysis, this has the unique opportunity to use "green electrons", this is the production of electricity through sustainable non-polluting methods (wind farms, hydroelectric dams etc.) and with the increased presence of these forms of energy production on the national grid providing a more sustainable process.