Corn Cobs’ Biochar as Green Host of Salt Hydrates for Enhancing the Water Sorption Kinetics in Thermochemical Heat Storage Systems
Open accessAbstract
Heat storage technologies are essential for increasing the use of solar energy in the household sector. Their development can be achieved by designing new storage materials; one way is to impregnate a porous matrix with hygroscopic salts. In this article, the possibility of using biochar-based composite sorbents to develop promising new heat storage materials for efficient thermal storage is explored. Biochar-based composites with defined salt loadings (5, 10, 15, and 20%) were produced by impregnating MgSO4 into a biochar matrix derived from corn cobs. The new materials demonstrated a high water sorption capacity of 0.24 g/g (20MgCC). After six successive charging-discharging cycles (dehydration/dehydration cycles), only a negligible variation of the heat released and the water uptake was measured, confirming the absence of deactivation of 20MgCC upon cycling. The new 20MgCC composite showed an energy storage density of 635 J/g (Tads = 30 °C and RH = 60%), higher than that of other composites containing a similar amount of hydrate salt. The macroporous nature of this biochar increases the available surface for salt deposition. During the hydration step, the water molecules effectively diffuse through a homogeneous layer of salt, as described by the intra-particle model applied in this work. The new efficient biochar-based composites open a low-carbon path for the production of sustainable thermal energy storage materials and applications.
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Following heat treatment, incorporation of sodium and magnesium metal salts into biochar typically involves thermal modification, such as high-temperature treatment (e.g., 500-900 °C range).
“Following the heat treatment, the incorporation of sodium and magnesium metal salts into biochar typically involves thermal modification, such as high-temperature treatment (e.g., 500–900 °C range).”
From Metals incorporated agricultural waste corn Cob-based biochar used as an adsorbent for CO2 capturing (2025) · cites this paper as [55]
Section 3.1, Preparation Method of Composites (page unavailable), reports that corncobs were pyrolyzed at 550 °C to make biochar, which was then impregnated with magnesium sulfate. The high-temperature step made the biochar; salt incorporation used an aqueous solution followed by drying at 60 °C and 150 °C. The paper does not establish a typical 500–900 °C treatment for incorporating salts or address sodium-salt incorporation. (LLM, conf=0.88)
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Research works printed but not linked: 1
- [22]Bruckman V.J. Varol E.A. Liu J. Uzun B.B. Biochar Cambridge University Press Cambridge, UK 2016 9781107117099
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Metals incorporated agricultural waste corn Cob-based biochar used as an adsorbent for CO2 capturing
Ahmed, S., Hossain, D., Dipti, S. S., Karim, M. A., & Azad, M. A. K. (2025) · Scientific Reports · doi:10.1038/s41598-025-31699-3 · Cited by 4 · see citing works
“This thermal process helps activate the biochar and enhances its physicochemical properties, such as porosity and surface area, making it more effective for adsorption and metal incorporation 55 .”
- Authors
- Nguyen, M. H., Zbair, M., Dutournié, P., Limousy, L., & Bennici, S.
- Affiliations
- Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (FR)
- Corresponding author
- Bennici, Simona
- Venue
- Molecules
- Publisher
- MDPI AG
- Published
- 2023-07-13
- Volume
- 28
- Issue
- 14
- Pages
- 5381
- ISSN
- 1420-3049 (ISSN-L)
- PMC
- PMC10383902
- OpenAlex
- W4384341156
- Cited by
- 8
- References
- 50
- Citations by year
- 2026: 2 · 2025: 6
- FWCI
- 0.79
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Molecules (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
- Funders
- Region Grand Est
- IS2M “Projets Structurants”
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Engineering › Mechanical Engineering › Adsorption and Cooling Systems
- Physical Sciences › Engineering › Mechanical Engineering › Phase Change Materials Research
- Physical Sciences › Engineering › Biomedical Engineering › Chemical Looping and Thermochemical Processes
- Keywords
- biochar, corn cob, salt hydrates, magnesium sulfate, thermochemical energy storage, water sorption kinetics, composite adsorbent, solar energy storage, macroporous materials, energy storage density
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