Advances in Nanomaterials for Sustainable Gas Separation and Storage: Focus on Clathrate Hydrates

High-pressure Raman, infrared, x-ray, and neutron studies show that H2 and H2O mixtures crystallize into the sII clathrate structure with an approximate H2/H2O molar ratio of 1:2. The clathrate cages are multiply occupied, with a cluster of two H2 molecules in the small cage and four in the large cage. Substantial softening and splitting of hydrogen vibrons indicate increased intermolecular interactions. The quenched clathrate is stable up to 145 kelvin at ambient pressure. Retention of hydrogen at such high temperatures could help its condensation in planetary nebulae and may play a key role in the evolution of icy bodies.

Selected metal-organic frameworks exhibiting representative properties--high surface area, structural flexibility, or the presence of open metal cation sites--were tested for utility in the separation of CO(2) from H(2) via pressure swing adsorption. Single-component CO(2) and H(2) adsorption isotherms were measured at 313 K and pressures up to 40 bar for Zn(4)O(BTB)(2) (MOF-177, BTB(3-) = 1,3,5-benzenetribenzoate), Be(12)(OH)(12)(BTB)(4) (Be-BTB), Co(BDP) (BDP(2-) = 1,4-benzenedipyrazolate), H(3)[(Cu(4)Cl)(3)(BTTri)(8)] (Cu-BTTri, BTTri(3-) = 1,3,5-benzenetristriazolate), and Mg(2)(dobdc) (dobdc(4-) = 1,4-dioxido-2,5-benzenedicarboxylate). Ideal adsorbed solution theory was used to estimate realistic isotherms for the 80:20 and 60:40 H(2)/CO(2) gas mixtures relevant to H(2) purification and precombustion CO(2) capture, respectively. In the former case, the results afford CO(2)/H(2) selectivities between 2 and 860 and mixed-gas working capacities, assuming a 1 bar purge pressure, as high as 8.6 mol/kg and 7.4 mol/L. In particular, metal-organic frameworks with a high concentration of exposed metal cation sites, Mg(2)(dobdc) and Cu-BTTri, offer significant improvements over commonly used adsorbents, indicating the promise of such materials for applications in CO(2)/H(2) separations.

This review includes the current state of the art understanding and advances in technical developments about various fields of gas hydrates, which are combined with expert perspectives and analyses. Gas hydrates have received considerable attention due to their important role in flow assurance for the oil and gas industry, their extensive natural occurrence on Earth and extraterrestrial planets, and their significant applications in sustainable technologies including but not limited to gas and energy storage, gas separation, and water desalination. Given not only their inherent structural flexibility depending on the type of guest gas molecules and formation conditions, but also the synthetic effects of a wide range of chemical additives on their properties, these variabilities could be exploited to optimise the role of gas hydrates. This includes increasing their industrial applications, understanding and utilising their role in Nature, identifying potential methods for safely extracting natural gases stored in naturally occurring hydrates within the Earth, and for developing green technologies. This review summarizes the different properties of gas hydrates as well as their formation and dissociation kinetics and then reviews the fast-growing literature reporting their role and applications in the aforementioned fields, mainly concentrating on advances during the last decade. Challenges, limitations, and future perspectives of each field are briefly discussed. The overall objective of this review is to provide readers with an extensive overview of gas hydrates that we hope will stimulate further work on this riveting field.