Calcium Oxide Nanoparticles as An Effective Filtration Aid for Purification of Vehicle Gas Exhaust

Calcium oxide nanoparticles and its potential towards purification of vehicle gas exhaust were investigated in this work. Calcium oxide nanoparticles were synthesised and its efficiency in absorbing constituents of vehicle gas exhaust has been estimated. Calcium oxide nanoparticles were synthesised by chemical coprecipitation and thermal decomposition of chicken egg shells. The obtained powdered particles were characterised using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, SEM and X-ray diffraction techniques. The powdered products on the addition of polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) have been fabricated into a nanoporous membrane using electrospinning technique. The thin film was made with varying weight per cent of CaO particles. The efficiency of these membranes was estimated by passing exhaust gas through it using exhaust gas analyser/smoke metre. The FT-IR analysis confirms the presence of CaO particles. The SEM and XRD of the obtained samples showed the crystalline nature of CaO nanoparticles, and the size of the powdered CaO was found to be ~15–20 nm. The nanoporous electrospun membrane has low filtration capacity. The other two CaO nanoparticles with varying weight percentage showed great potential towards purifying vehicle gas exhaust. It reduces the quantity of HC, CO, CO₂ in high rates. It is also proved that increase in the concentration of CaO increased the efficiency of filtration.