Reducing carbon emissions globally is crucial and necessary, but the elimination of greenhouse gases is also considered key to achieving net zero emissions and limiting the worst impacts of climate change. Scientists say that capturing carbon emissions in the atmosphere is the "last mile" towards achieving carbon neutrality, but is there really a technological way to "capture" carbon dioxide (CO2) directly from the air? According to a new report in the journal Nature, researchers from the University of Cambridge in the UK have found that by injecting ions that can form reversible bonds with CO2 into activated carbon sponges, charged materials can directly capture CO2 from the air.

Direct air capture is a potential carbon capture method that uses sponge like materials to remove CO2 from the atmosphere. Researchers speculate that if activated carbon could be charged like a battery, it could become a suitable material for carbon capture. So they charged the cheap activated carbon cloth with hydroxide ions. This type of cloth is roughly like an electrode in a battery, where hydroxide ions gather in the tiny pores of activated carbon. At the end of the charging process, researchers remove the activated carbon from the battery, clean it, and air dry it.

Tests on charged "sponges" have shown that, thanks to the bonding mechanism of hydroxides, they can successfully capture CO2 directly from the air. This is a new method of manufacturing materials that uses a process similar to batteries, and its CO2 capture rate can already be comparable to existing materials.

In order to collect CO2 from activated carbon for purification and storage, it is necessary to heat the material to break the chemical bond between the hydroxide and CO2. Currently, most materials used to capture CO2 from the air need to be heated to temperatures as high as 900 ℃ and typically use natural gas. However, the charged activated carbon sponge only needs to be heated to 90-100 ℃, which can be achieved through the use of renewable electricity. These materials are heated by resistance heating, essentially heating the material from the inside out, with a faster process and lower energy intensity.

However, these materials do have limitations, such as average performance in humid environments. Researchers are working hard to overcome these limitations.

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