Metal-Organic Framework (MOF) Sorbents

While cryogenic air separation is the technology of choice to supply oxygen at large scales, such plants are very expensive and include complex hardware that prevents their cost-effective scale down and use in small installations. At the small scale, pressure swing adsorption (PSA) is widely used.  PSA is based on the selective reversible adsorption of nitrogen (but not oxygen) onto molecular sieve sorbents.  As a result, the conventional PSA process delivers a more expensive product, mainly due to the inefficiencies involved in the adsorption of the major component (nitrogen) from a high pressure air and its subsequent discharge at ambient pressure (most of the work input provided during compression is lost).     

TDA Research has identified a new metal organic framework (MOF) adsorbent with very high selectivity for oxygen.  Due to this high oxygen selectivity, the separation process could potentially operate with much higher energy efficiency than a conventional PSA process.  We optimized the synthesis of the material to address the trade-off between the oxygen selectivity and uptake, and developed a unique preparation process to ensure the best material properties while also achieving cost effective large scale manufacturing.  A highly efficient PSA cycle scheme was also developed that produces oxygen at a high purity and yield. 

Excellent candidates for adsorption/purification applications

• Advantages

  • Exposed metal centers (both coordinated and uncoordinated)

  • Functionalization through linkers/ligands

  • Well-controlled structure tailored for a given application

  • Very high surface area – up to 8,000 m2/g

  • Very high controllable porosity

  • Thermal/hydrothermal stability up to 200oC

• MOFS for CO2 Removal

• MOFS for Air Separation

• MOFS for NH3 removal

• MOF Textiles