Post-combustion carbon capture, wherein the CO2 produced as a result of coal combustion is trapped at the power plant exhaust, is seen as a bridging technology to reduce CO2 emissions and combat climate change. This capture process will however impose a parasitic load on the power plant and technologies need to be developed to minimize this energy penalty. This research focuses on a technology which uses solid sorbents fashioned into a hollow fiber form that allows water-moderated thermal cycling as a means of trapping CO2 from flue gas. While hollow fiber technology has intrinsic advantages over competing liquid amine and packed bed technologies, the materials used to fabricate hollow fibers and the fabrication process itself need to be optimized in order to result in competitive, robust hollow fiber sorbents. This dissertation focuses on the material selection process for each component of the hollow fiber platform and discusses ways to optimize the fiber and barrier layer formation. Different materials were evaluated to function as the solid sorbent, the matrix polymer and the barrier layer; and eventually their performance was measured against past work in this area.

Différentes familles de liquides ioniques ont été sélectionnées pour leur capacité d’absorption de gaz et plus particulièrement de dioxyde de carbone. L’objectif de ces travaux est de définir les liquides ioniques les plus à même d’être utilisés en tant qu’absorbants dits alternatifs dans les procédés de captage de gaz, l’enjeu principal étant à terme de diminuer les coûts de production des procédés industriels. Les systèmes retenus sont des liquides ioniques purs issus de la combinaison de cations imidazolium, pyrrolidinium et phosphonium avec des anions de type carboxylate ou tris (pentafluoroethyl) trifluorophosphate ainsi que des mélanges binaires de liquides ioniques avec anion carboxylate + eau. L’absorption de différents gaz - dioxyde de carbone, azote, protoxyde d’azote et éthane - dans les liquides ioniques purs ainsi que dans les mélanges liquide ionique +eau a été mesurée dans une gamme de températures comprises entre 303.15 et 353.15 K et pour des pressions proches de l’atmosphérique. La sélectivité des liquides ioniques pour l’absorption de dioxyde de carbone par rapport aux autres gaz a pu être déterminée. La caractérisation de l’absorption de gaz est fonction des systèmes étudiés, les interactions entre les gaz et certains liquides ioniques (ou certains mélanges liquide ionique + eau) étant uniquement de type physique alors que dans d’autres systèmes, l’absorption est le résultat à la fois d’interactions physiques mais également de la présence de réaction chimique. / Different classes of ionic liquids have been selected for their ability to solubilize gases and more particularly carbon dioxide. The objective of this work is to define the ionic liquids which are most likely to be used as alternative absorbents in capture processes of gases, the main issue is to reduce the costs of production of the industrial processes. The systems used are the pure ionic liquids from the combination of imidazolium, phosphonium and pyrrolidinium cation with carboxylate or tris (pentafluoroethyl) trifluorophosphate anion and binary mixtures of ionic liquids with carboxylate anion + water. The absorption of different gases - carbon dioxide, nitrogen, nitrous oxide and ethane – in pure ionic liquids as well as in mixtures of ionic liquid + water was measured in a temperature range of between 303.15 and 353.15 K and pressures close to atmospheric. The selectivity of ionic liquids for the absorption of carbon dioxide from other gases could was determined. Characterization of gas absorption is a function of the studied system, since the interactions between gas and ionic liquid (or mixture ionic liquid + water) are of the physical type for some systems, while in other, the absorption is the result of both physical interaction and chemical reaction.