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Goal is to develop a technology for producing microengineered adsorbent carbons from Illinois coal and to evaluate their potential application for storing natural gas for use in emerging low pressure, natural gas vehicles (NGVs). Focus is to design and engineer adsorbents that meet or exceed performance and cost targets established for low-pressure natural gas storage materials. Potentially, about two million tons adsorbent could be consumed in NGVs by year 2000. If successful, the results could lead to use of Illinois coal in a market that could exceed 6 million tons per year. Activated carbon samples were prepared from IBC-106 coal by controlling both the preoxidation temperature and time, and the devolatilization temperature in order to eliminate coal caking. A 4.6 cc pressurized vessel was constructed to measure the Vm/Vs methane adsorption capacity (volume of stored methane at STP per volume storage container). Several IBC-106 derived activated carbons showed methane adsorption capacities comparable to that of a 1000 m{sup 2}/g commercial activated carbon. Results indicated that surface area and micropore volume of activated carbons are important for natural gas storage. Work is in progress to synthesize samples from IBC-106 coal with optimum pore diameter for methane adsorption. |
