Preparation of nitrogen doped carbon from tree leaves as efficient CO2 adsorbent

Highlights: • Microporous nitrogen doped carbon is prepared from camphor leaves. • A very high specific surface area of 1736 m²/g is achieved. • Nitrogen doping exhibits positive effects on CO₂ uptake and adsorption selectivity. In this work, we reported the synthesis of nitrogen doped carbons from camphor tree leaves. The leaves were carbonized and then activated with KOH, and the nitrogen element in the leaves was used as the nitrogen source. The carbon showed a high surface area of 1736 m²/g. A high CO₂ uptake of 5.86 mmol/g at 1 bar and 273 K was achieved by the carbon activated at 600 °C. The test results also revealed that for carbons with similar volume of small micropores, the one with a high nitrogen content tended to achieve better adsorption performances.