Carbon capture, a chemical separation of carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere, has been a promising technology to reduce the growing carbon emissions globally. The amine-based adsorbents are extensively investigated for their selectiveness towards CO2 at variable concentrations and Mesostructured Cellular Foam (MCF) silica as a support structure, provides favorable open pore network geometry for incorporating the amine. The pelletized form of Polyethylenimine (PEI) infiltrated MCF is a proven scalable process that employs sonication to infiltrate the MCF with PEI. This work demonstrates and systematically explores the effect of sonication by controlling the essential parameters of frequency, amplitude, and time of the wave. This work also provides a novel understanding of the modifications created by the sonication treatments and the variations suggest the importance of morphology for capture capacity. Results support the concept, as CO2 uptake capacity improves accordingly with the sonication treatment. The highest observed uptake capacity was 3.04 mmol/g of pellet sonicated at 40 KHz and a wave amplitude of 50% for 30 seconds. These preliminary results would tend to prove that sonication energy affects carbon capture capacity, though there is, as yet, a lack of understanding regarding the exact underlying mechanism, suggesting the need for further investigation. Determining this mechanism would be a very exciting development, as it would allow the improved process to be scaled for commercial use, potentially meeting the growing demand for carbon capture technologies around the world.
