Made-to-order metal-organic frameworks for trace carbon dioxide removal and air capture

Direct air capture is regarded as a plausible alternate approach that, if economically practical, can mitigate the increasing carbon dioxide emissions associated with two of the main carbon polluting sources, namely stationary power plants and transportation. Here we show that metal-organic framework crystal chemistry permits the construction of an isostructural metal-organic framework (SIFSIX-3-Cu) based on pyrazine/copper(II) two-dimensional periodic 44 square grids pillared by silicon hexafluoride anions and thus allows further contraction of the pore system to 3.5 versus 3.84 Å for the parent zinc(II) derivative. This enhances the adsorption energetics and subsequently displays carbon dioxide uptake and selectivity at very low partial pressures relevant to air capture and trace carbon dioxide removal. The resultant SIFSIX-3-Cu exhibits uniformly distributed adsorption energetics and offers enhanced carbon dioxide physical adsorption properties, uptake and selectivity in highly diluted gas streams, a performance, to the best of our knowledge, unachievable with other classes of porous materials. The capture and removal of low-concentration carbon dioxide from air is appealing. Here, the authors report a metal-organic framework with a precisely tuned network of pores and optimal charge density, which is capable of carbon dioxide uptake at very low partial pressures relevant to direct air capture.