Rigidity with Flexibility: Porous Triptycene Networks for Enhancing Methane Storage.

Area of Science:

• Materials Science
• Chemical Engineering
• Environmental Science

Background:

• Natural gas (NG) is a crucial clean transportation fuel with significant environmental and energy benefits.
• Efficient methane storage materials are essential for widespread NG adoption.
• Triptycene-based hypercrosslinked polymers (HCPs) offer a promising platform for gas storage applications.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop novel triptycene-based hypercrosslinked polymers (HCPs) for enhanced methane storage.
• To investigate the structure-property relationships governing methane adsorption in these materials.
• To evaluate the performance of synthesized HCPs under high-pressure conditions.

Main Methods:

• Synthesis of two triptycene-based HCPs (PTN-70 and PTN-71) using rigid and flexible linkers (dichloromethane and 1,3-dichloropropane).
• Characterization of polymer properties, including Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) surface area.
• Measurement of methane adsorption capacity at various pressures and temperatures.

Main Results:

• PTN-70 and PTN-71 were successfully synthesized via cost-effective fabrication.
• PTN-71 exhibited a lower BET surface area than PTN-70.
• PTN-71 demonstrated significantly enhanced methane adsorption capacity (329 cm³ g⁻¹ at 95 bar, 275 K), attributed to its flexible network structure and swelling response.

Conclusions:

• Tailoring the structural flexibility of HCPs is critical for optimizing methane storage performance.
• PTN-71 represents a highly promising material for high-pressure methane storage applications.
• This work advances the development of advanced materials for clean energy solutions.