Incorporation of Chemisorptive Properties into Activated Carbon Fibres

摘要

Dstl Porton Down has been investigating the potential for carbon fibres to be utilised as a filter medium capable of removing both particulate and vapour challenges. Adsorption of low boiling species, such as hydrogen cyanide (HCN) and cyanogen chloride (CNCl), requires the impregnation of metals such as copper (Cu) and chromium (Cr) into the porous network. This paper describes efforts to incorporate chemisorptive properties into the activated carbon fibres by a variety of different methods, including incipient wetness, vacuum impregnation and plasma deposition. The total metal uptakes of the fibres for each method have been ascertained and their ability to remove HCN under dynamic flow conditions assessed. Initial studies suggest that vacuum impregnation is the most successful method for introducing metals into the porous network of the activated carbon fibres. All three impregnation techniques could remove HCN for varying duration with the vacuum impregnated carbon fibres again providing the best results.