High surface area calcite

Calcite (CaCO3) is important in many fields—in nature, because it is a component of aquifers, oil reservoirs and prospective CO2 storage sites, and in industry, where it is used in products as diverse as paper, toothpaste, paint, plastic and aspirin. It is difficult to obtain high purity calcite with a high surface area but such material is necessary for industrial applications and for fundamental calcite research. Commercial powder is nearly always contaminated with growth inhibitors such as sugars, citrate or pectin and most laboratory synthesis methods deliver large precipitates, often containing vaterite or aragonite. To address this problem, we (i) adapted the method of carbonating a Ca(OH)2 slurry with CO2 gas to develop the first simple, cheap, safe and reproducible procedure using common laboratory equipment, to obtain calcite that reproducibly had a surface area of 14–17 m2/g and (ii) conducted a thorough characterization of the product. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) revealed nanometer scale, rhombohedral crystals. X-ray diffraction (XRD), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and infrared spectroscopy (IR) confirmed highly crystalline, pure calcite that more closely resembles the dimensions of the biogenic calcite produced by algae in coccoliths than other methods for synthesizing calcite. We suggest that this calcite is useful when purity and high surface area are important.

► We synthesize pure and high surface area calcite using common lab equipment.
► We report the broadest characterization of carbonation-produced calcite published.
► The product is pure, crystalline and similar to calcite in biogenic chalk.
► The synthesis method is reproducible and the surface area is stable in solution.
► We propose the product for calcite surface research and industrial applications.