Fabrication of Carbon Fiber Electrodes for Capacitive Deionization

For water reclamation and for better water quality, development of advanced wastewater treatment technologies has been an important issue. Capacitive deionization (CDI) captures ions in the porous conductive materials and thus to removal ions from water. The captured ions can be released once the system is discharged. Compare to membrane filtration, CDI does not require large power consumption to overcome osmotic pressure and does not have fouling problem. Therefore, CDI, which was originally developed to deionize sea and brackish waters, has been considered a promising technology for water reclamation. The overlapping of double layer may prohibit the transport of ions into pores. The porous characteristics of current carbonaceous electrodes limit the theoretical investigation and application in water/wastewater treatment of CDI. Thus, it is proposed to fabricate carbonaceous fiber as CDI electrodes via electrospinning. The main objective of the first year is to determine the optimal preparation conditions of the carbonaceous fiber. The performance of the prepared electrode in CDI will also be evaluated. In the second year, metal oxide/carbonaceous fiber composite will be prepared in order to enhance the adsorption of ions. The influences of organic compounds on the deionization will also be investigated. The experimental results will be modeled by adsorption kinetics, isotherms, double-layer Donnan equations. It is proposed that by using electrodes with better porous characteristics, the adsorption and transport of ions in CDI could be better understood.