Isosteric heat of adsorption (H_st) is critical for evaluating the thermal effects of adsorption-based storage systems. Poor management of the thermal effects of an adsorptive storage system often alters the overall performance of the storage system. In this study, methane equilibrium uptake on activated carbons derived from coal discards and isosteric heat of adsorption were evaluated. The methane adsorption capacity of the produced activated carbons was measured using a high-pressure volumetric analyzer. The isotherm results in temperature ranges of 0–50 °C and pressure of up to 40 bar are analyzed using the Langmuir, Tóth, and Dubinin–Astakhov (DA) isotherm models. The results showed that, for the two activated carbons, the DA model was the best fit. In addition, we evaluated the isosteric heat of adsorption using two theoretical frameworks, Maxwell’s thermodynamic relations and the modified Polanyi potential function. The Tóth potential function and Clausius–Clapeyron equations were applied to the Dubinin–Astakhov adsorption model to obtain an analytical expression of H_st. Both methods were compared, and the result showed an overall error margin between 6 and 12%. The values of H_st obtained are over a range of 10–17 kJ/mol. It was observed that H_st decreases with an increase in methane fractional load. The H_st values obtained are useful in designing an efficient thermodynamic scheme for the ANG storage system.

Lacking in literature is the use of discard coal to produce activated carbon and in its subsequent use in the storage of natural gas. In this study, the characterization and gas storage evaluation of a largely porous activated carbon with large surface area synthesized from discard coal were investigated. Discard coals are waste material generated from coal beneficiation process. In developing the activated carbon, chemical activation route with the use of KOH reagent was applied. The effects of KOH/discard coal weight ratio (1:1, 2.5:1, 4:1), temperature (400–800 °C) and particle size (0.15–0.25 mm, 0.25–0.5 mm, 0.5–1 mm) on the adsorptive properties of the activated carbon were methodically evaluated and optimized using response surface methodology. The synthesized activated carbon was characterized using BET, SEM/EDS, and XRD. The results showed that for each activation process, the surface area and pore volume of the resulting activated carbon increased with increased temperature and KOH/discard coal weight ratio. The maximum surface area of 1826.41 m²/g, pore volume of 1.252 cm³/g and pore size of 2.77 nm were obtained at carbonization temperature of 800 °C and KOH/discard coal weight ratio of 4:1. Methane and nitrogen adsorption data at high pressure were fitted to Toth isotherm model with a predictive accuracy of about 99%. Adsorption parameters using the Toth model provides useful information in the design of adsorbed natural gas storage system. According to the requirements of adsorbent desired for natural gas storage, it could be stated that the synthesized activated carbon could well be applied for natural gas storage.

Globally, the provision of energy is becoming an absolute necessity. Biomass resources are abundant and have been described as a potential alternative source of energy. However, it is important to assess the fuel characteristics of the various available biomass sources. Soft computing techniques are presented in this study to predict the mass yield (MY), energy yield (EY), and higher heating value (HHV) of hydrothermally carbonized biomass using Gene Expression Programming (GEP), multiple-input single output-artificial neural network (MISO-ANN), and Multilinear regression (MLR). The three techniques were compared using statistical performance metrics. The coefficient of determination (R²), mean absolute error (MAE) and mean bias error (MBE) were used to evaluate the performance of the models. The MISO-ANN with 5-10 to 10-1 and 5-15-15-1 network architectures provided the most satisfactory performance of the three proposed models (R² = 0.976, 0.955, 0.996; MAE = 2.24, 2.11, 0.93; MBE = 0.16, 0.37, 0.12) for MY, EY and HHV, respectively. The GEP technique’s ability to predict hydrochar properties based on the input parameters was found to be satisfactory, while MLR provided an unsatisfactory predictive model. Sensitivity analysis was conducted, and the analysis revealed that volatile matter (VM) and temperature (Temp) have more influence on the MY, EY, and HHV.

The development of new, efficient and cost-effective technologies for acid gases (CO₂ and H₂S) removal from natural gas is pertinent for cleaner energy productions. The removal of acid gases from natural gas can be carried out using different techniques (chemical, physical or hybrid). Although the widely employed techniques are generally effective, they have some ascribed drawbacks such as process efficiency and high-energy cost. Emerging techniques are being considered to reduce or eliminate these limitations but their deployment on an industrial scale may require that certain scientific and technological criteria, such as higher selectivity and gas separation kinetics, be met. Unprecedented and lacking in previous appraisals, this review has focused on the emerging and sustainable developments on acid gases removal from natural gas, but not without a critical evaluation of the existing technologies to provide a better background on the subject, ascertain the status-quo and identify gaps for further improvements. Efficiency of these emerging technologies are analysed with focus on ionic liquids and their blends, binding organic liquids, enzyme-based separation technologies and others. This review also features the brief contribution of the authors towards the development of low-cost materials for CO₂/natural gas separation. This article is expected to serve as an in-depth requisite background for further research on carbon capture processes with respect to natural gas purification.