Functionalized mesoporous SiO2 materials for CO2 capture and catalytic conversion to cyclic carbonates

ABSTRACTCarbon dioxide as the main culprit of global temperature rising has seized the attention worldwide. CO2 capture and storage can rapidly decrease the CO2 concentration in the atmosphere. As it is also recognized as eminent C1 source, reasonable CO2 utilization is a promising method for solving CO2 problems. Among various CO2 conversion pathways, epoxide-CO2 cycloaddition is a fascinating approach owing to its 100% atomic efficiency. Till nowadays, various sorbents and catalysts emerged for efficient CO2 capture and epoxide-CO2 cycloaddition catalysis. Mesoporous SiO2 as a good carrier attracts tremendous interests in its improvements for more effective CO2 capture and conversion catalysis in the past two decades resulting from its good hydrothermal stability and easy-modification. Abundant silanol as hydrogen bond donors also benefits the reaction catalysis. Functionalization from metal introduction to nonmetal active components supporting has been applied to improve the CO2 adsorption capacity and the catalytic activity of mesoporous SiO2 to epoxide-CO2 cycloaddition. Therefore, an overview on the progress in functionalized mesoporous SiO2 for CO2 capture and conversion to cyclic carbonates catalysis is summarized here to make a clear understanding to the role of functionalized mesoporous SiO2 as CO2 sorbents and catalysts in the epoxide-CO2 cycloaddition reaction.KEYWORDS: CO2 adsorptionCO2 conversioncyclic carbonatefunctionalized mesoporous SiO2 AcknowledgmentsThis work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (21972034), the State Key Lab of Urban Water Resource and Environment of Harbin Institute of Technology (HIT2022TS25) and the Heilongjiang Touyan Team (HITTY-20190033).Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.