There is a high demand for developing a more effective and environment-friendly
technology to substitute the complicated and hazardous Boliden–Norzink
technology for recovering gaseous Hg0 from smelting flue
gas. In this work, a low-cost and reproducible sorbent (FeMoS
x
/TiO2) was developed to recover gaseous
Hg0 from smelting flue gas. FeMoS
x
/TiO2 exhibited a superior ability for capturing high
concentrations of Hg0, with an adsorption rate of 72.2
μg g–1 min–1 and a capacity
of 41.8 mg g–1 at 60 °C. These were generally
larger than the sums of those of FeS
x
/TiO2 and MoS
x
/TiO2. The
kinetic model of Hg0 adsorption by FeS
x
/TiO2, MoS
x
/TiO2, and FeMoS
x
/TiO2 were
constructed according to the adsorption mechanism. Then, the structure–activity
relationship of FeMoS
x
/TiO2 for Hg0 capture was determined by comparing the kinetic
parameters. The intrinsic adsorption of Hg0 by MoS
x
/TiO2 (i.e., physically adsorbed
Hg0 was oxidized by MoS3 to HgS) was inhibited
marginally after FeS
x
was incorporated.
However, another Hg0 adsorption route (i.e., physically
adsorbed Hg0 was oxidized by FeS2 to HgS) appeared
on FeMoS
x
/TiO2. Its rate was
significantly higher than that of FeS
x
/TiO2. Thus, a novel synergistic effect of Fe and Mo in
FeMoS
x
/TiO2 for Hg0 capture was observed.
To replace the hazardous and complicated Boliden−Norzink technology, the technology of Hg 0 recovery from smelting flue gas by a magnetic and reproducible sulfureted MoO 3 /Fe−Ti spinel was employed to keep the produced H 2 SO 4 free of Hg. The sulfureted MoO 3 /Fe−Ti spinel showed excellent performance in capturing gaseous Hg 0 , with an average adsorption rate of 93.3 μg g −1 min −1 and an adsorption capacity of 66.3 mg g −1 at 60 °C, which were much better than those of most of the other reported sorbents. Meanwhile, the sulfureted MoO 3 /Fe−Ti spinel exhibited excellent superparamagnetism and magnetization of 19.9 emu g −1 , which ensured that it could easily be magnetically separated without a specialized precipitator or the molding of pulverous sorbents to monolithic sorbents. To investigate the promotion mechanism of MoO 3 loading on Hg 0 adsorption onto the sulfureted Fe−Ti spinel, the Hg 0 adsorption kinetic parameters of the sulfureted MoO 3 /Fe−Ti spinel and sulfureted Fe−Ti spinel, resulting from the fitting of the adsorption breakthrough curves based on the kinetic model, were compared. The promotion of MoO 3 loading was attributed to the remarkable increase in the adsorption sites on the sulfureted Fe−Ti spinel for Hg 0 physical adsorption, which was mainly related to the formation of the MoS 3 layer.
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