The 2008/2009 George D. Graffin Lectureship in Carbon Science and Engineering

Dr. Frederick S. Baker
Senior Staff Member, Oak Ridge National Laboratory

Nanoporous Carbon Materials - How They Benefit Our Lives and the Environment

The American Carbon Society supported by grants from the Asbury Graphite Mills, Inc., sponsors this lecture series in North American Universities in honor of George D. Graffin, a pioneer in the natural graphite industry. Each year the Society selects a lecturer who has made distinguished contributions to carbon science and engineering. The lecture is available to North American universities, by arrangement with the lecturer.

Abstract:
Broad topic areas covered in the talk will include the development, production, properties, and many uses of nanoporous (activated) carbon materials, especially those that have bearing on our lives and the protection of the environment. A brief walk will be taken through the history of porous carbon, from it's first recorded medicinal uses in 1550 BC, its link to the Royal Navy's blockade of French ports during the Napoleonic wars, it's major development and use in the Great War (and subsequent wars), to helping to put America's national beverage, Coca-Cola, in our shopping carts.

Examples will be discussed of how activated carbon is used to purify the air that we breathe, the water that we drink, and the food that we place on our dining tables. The many industrial uses of activated carbon will be highlighted in the contexts of preventing environmental pollution and the economical recovery of valuable process chemicals. Insights will be provided on the use of porous carbon materials for electrical energy storage, notably in increasingly smaller, yet higher energy density electrochemical (super) capacitors, and in the gasoline vapor recovery systems on vehicles.

For those that have yearned to circumvent the Ideal Gas Laws, information will be provided on how to store as much fuel gas (e.g., natural gas) in a cylinder at 500 psi as in the same size cylinder pressurized to 3,000 psi. And just in case those same folks have signed up for a seat on a manned mission to Mars, the talk will conclude with an introduction to projects on the production and use of activated carbon on the surface of the red planet, for the growing of food crops, recycling of oxygen and water, and use in life support breathing systems.

For those audiences interested in the additional subject matter, the talk will include a discussion of a major research program underway at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory on the development of processes for the low cost production of carbon fibers from renewable resource materials for lightweight automotive composites. The additional subject matter will include the melt spinning of precursor fibers from lignin, conversion to carbon fiber, and an introduction to the economic modeling of this and related processes under development at Oak Ridge.

To comply with Export Control (ITAR) requirements, the discussion of conversion processes will be confined to a broad brush description, but the advanced processing techniques under evaluation will be mentioned, including microwave-assisted plasma. The relevance of this research program will be placed into context with the nation's latest "energy crisis," and how this and related biomass research work could greatly help to alleviate the nation's dependence on imported oil for the production of fuels and chemicals.