Carbon black and polydopamine modified non-woven fabric enabling efficient solar steam generation towards seawater desalination and wastewater purification

Abstract

The utilization of solar energy for steam generation is a highly efficient and sustainable technology for seawater desalination to solve the long-standing water crisis. Carbon-based materials have shown promising thermal-heat conversion efficiency due to their broadband solar absorption. Herein, carbon black (CB) was combined with polydopamine (PDA) to develop a high-performance, low-cost, and scalable PDA/CB@PP composite non-woven fabric was fabricated by dip-coating of CB and in situ polymerization of PDA. The hierarchical structure constructed on the fiber surface and the synergetic effects of CB and PDA contributed to the high light absorbance (>95%), superhydrophilicity, and high energy conversion efficiency. The one-way fluidic PDA/CB@PP photothermal based solar steam evaporator demonstrated a high evaporation rate of 1.68 kg m-2 h-1 with a solar steam efficiency of 91.5%. Moreover, the PDA/CB@PP fabric shows remarkable salt resistance when purifying seawater because of the water channel preserved by the hydrophilic porous structure of the fabric which could provide sustained water supply. Besides, the PDA/CB@PP fabric possesses excellent purification capability to wastewaters contaminated by heavy-metal and chemical dyes. This study provides insights into the design and development of low-cost, scalable, highly stable, and efficient solar steam generators for seawater desalination and wastewater purification.

Publication DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.seppur.2021.119621
Divisions: College of Engineering & Physical Sciences > School of Infrastructure and Sustainable Engineering > Engineering Systems and Supply Chain Management
Additional Information: © 2021, Elsevier. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ Funding: This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (51603075, 12072325), National Key R&D Program of China (2019YFA0706802).
Uncontrolled Keywords: Carbon black,Desalination,Polydopamine,Salt resistance,Solar steam generation,Analytical Chemistry,Filtration and Separation
Publication ISSN: 1383-5866
Last Modified: 09 Dec 2024 08:39
Date Deposited: 01 Sep 2021 08:23
Full Text Link:
Related URLs: https://linking ... 383586621013290 (Publisher URL)
http://www.scop ... tnerID=8YFLogxK (Scopus URL)
PURE Output Type: Article
Published Date: 2022-01-01
Published Online Date: 2021-09-01
Accepted Date: 2021-08-29
Authors: Sun, Shuangjie
Sun, Binbin
Wang, Yameng
Fordjour Antwi-Afari, Maxwell (ORCID Profile 0000-0002-6812-7839)
Mi, Hao-yang
Guo, Zhanhu
Liu, Chuntai
Shen, Changyu

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