FUNIMAT (ICMol-UV) secures an ERC Proof of Concept to develop a new CO₂ capture material under high-humidity conditions

Capturing carbon dioxide in the presence of water is one of the major challenges facing current decarbonisation technologies. The FUNIMAT group (Functional Inorganic Materials Team) at the Institute of Molecular Science (ICMol) of the University of Valencia has developed a new material capable of maintaining its performance even in highly humid environments, a common condition in real industrial streams. This breakthrough has been recognised with an ERC Proof of Concept grant, which will enable the material to move closer to validation and industrial application.

The development originates from the ERC project LIVINGPORE, led by Carlos Martí Gastaldo, head of the group, and aims to advance from laboratory-based innovation towards scale-up, validation and potential market transfer.

The challenge of CO₂ capture in humid environments

Under controlled conditions, many materials are able to absorb CO₂. However, the real challenge arises when CO₂ is mixed with other components that interact more strongly with the material, especially water vapour. In this competition, CO₂ is usually displaced, which significantly reduces capture capacity and makes operation in real environments difficult.

The material MUV-92 (MUV = Materials of the University of Valencia), developed within the framework of the LIVINGPORE project and at the core of the new WETCAP project, stands out precisely for its behaviour under humid conditions: it retains a very high fraction of its CO₂ capture capacity as relative humidity increases. This is a key attribute for applications where the presence of water vapour limits or increases the cost of existing technologies.

When scientific curiosity opens new applications

Although the work is framed within the ERC Consolidator project LIVINGPORE, the result that led to this proof of concept was not an initial objective of the project. Martí Gastaldo highlights the value of this type of discovery in research: “It is a good example of how curiosity can open up an application pathway that was not originally foreseen.”

As Martí Gastaldo explains, the material was not initially developed with a specific application in mind, but emerged from curiosity-driven exploration by Ramón y Cajal researcher Natalia Muñoz and PhD students Víctor Carratalá and Clara Chinchilla, within the methodological framework for designing new porous materials developed in the project. Only later was its potential for CO₂ capture under high-humidity conditions identified, transforming this experimental finding into a new and promising line of application.

The material is based on a specific chemical design developed by FUNIMAT, related to pyrazole-type linkers, used for the preparation of advanced porous structures. From this discovery, the team has defined a clear application niche: scenarios where other state-of-the-art materials lose performance due to the presence of water. In Martí Gastaldo’s words, this approach reflects a broader vision of research impact: “I do not believe in the dichotomy between basic and applied research: generating knowledge is always progress; what changes is how close or far we are from its application.”

Advantages over other materials

In the field of CO₂ capture, there are classical adsorbents (such as zeolites or silica) and more recent MOF-type materials with strong scientific and industrial impact. However, many of them significantly reduce their capacity in the presence of water.

The ICMol proposal is articulated around three main indicators:

• High-humidity capture: the material maintains high performance even at elevated relative humidity, unlike most current adsorbents. This enables efficient operation under conditions where other solutions lose capacity significantly.
  
  

• Easy regeneration: the interaction between CO₂ and the material is weak enough to allow release without intensive thermal cycles. This results in a simpler regeneration process, lower energy consumption and reduced operational costs.
  
  

• Cycling durability: the material preserves its performance after multiple capture and release cycles, ensuring long-term stability and reliability, a key requirement for industrial implementation.
  
  
  

In addition, one of the most relevant operational benefits would be the reduction or elimination of upstream gas drying steps, which are commonly required when humidity compromises capture. Removing this stage can reduce equipment investment and recurring costs, improving the overall viability of the process.

Potential applications

The team identifies particularly relevant cases involving highly humid gas streams, including:

• Biogas upgrading, where CO₂ must be separated to enrich methane.
  
  

• Fermentation gases and associated biological processes, for example in wastewater treatment, where mixtures of CO₂ and methane are generated under high humidity.
  
  

• Industrial flue gas streams, where humidity is a typical component of real operating conditions.
  
  

Rather than replacing existing technologies, the approach aims to complement them, offering a specific solution for high-humidity conditions where other alternatives are less effective, especially in pressure or vacuum swing adsorption systems (PSA/VSA).


Next steps

The proof of concept will make it possible to move through several stages to bring the material closer to real-world conditions:

• Scale-up of the material at ICMol, to produce larger quantities and facilitate external validation.
  
  

• Process adaptation (shaping), to move from powder to more industrially integrable formats (such as microspheres or pellets), using routes such as spray drying.
  
  

• Validation under dynamic conditions, using an in-house flow testing system capable of simulating controlled mixtures of CO₂, water vapour and carrier gases, and evaluating performance in scenarios close to real operation. As Carlos Martí Gastaldo explains, “what we want is to validate the material under real conditions.”
  
  

• Validation with companies, in collaboration with technology transfer agents, to test the material with real gas streams.
  
  

In parallel, the development is supported by intellectual property protection through patents and by an exploitation strategy based on licensing to academic start-ups such as the one founded by members of the FUNIMAT group (Porous Materials in Action) or industrial partners, with the aim of facilitating future transfer and application. As Carlos Martí Gastaldo emphasises, this dimension is essential in scientific research: “Seeing that a result born from scientific curiosity can contribute to solving real problems is one of the greatest values of research.”