Preparation of Activated Carbons from Waste External Thermal-Insulating Phenolic Foam Boards

Activated carbons (ACs) were prepared by steam physical activation or KOH chemical activation with the waste external thermal-insulating phenolic foam board as the raw material. The Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), X-ray diffraction (XRD), Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) specific area, pore-size distribution and iodine value were used to characterize the properties of ACs. AC-1(with the method of KOH chemical activation) has the iodine value of 2300mg/g, BET specific area of 1293 m2g-1, average pore-size of 2.4 nm, and mainly composed of micropore and relatively small mesopore. AC-2(with the method of steam physical activation) has the iodine value of 1665mg/g. Compared with AC-2, AC-1 had a pore-size distribution with more evenly and relative concentrated, it’s belonging to the high microporosity materials. Actually, chemical activation had more significant influence on destruction of the pore wall than physical activation.