Spectroscopic and Compositional Analysis of Hydrophobic Silica Aerogels and Their Applications in Crude Oil Adsorption

Abstract

The experiments studied the oil adsorption and doping effects of silica aerogels; doped with small percentages of silver and copper chloride, coumarin, and fluorescein dyes, were produced using a two-step acid-base catalyzed via sol-gel procedure. Tetraethoxysilicat (TEOS), methanol (MeOH), acid catalysis (0.1M), base catalysis NH₄OH:NH₄F (1:4), and modified solution trimethylchlorosilane (TMCS): n-hexane (1:10). Raman spectroscopy and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy are utilized to indicate the molecular bonds and their regions, and field emission scanning electron microscopy to investigate the morphological properties. The hydrophobic aerogel particles showed a very high uptake capacity. The desorption of oil by keeping the liquid-absorbed aerogel. From FTIR examination, the aerogel structure was not significantly altered by the solvent absorption but shrank as a consequence of the oil absorption; the homogenous structure is dominant. The doping gives a strongly skeleton network that gives a bearing to the produced samples to re-use in the mentioned application.