Demystifying mechanisms of metal impurities during CO2 mineralization of industrial solid wastes

Anthropogenic climate warming has led to more frequent climate extremes and pollution episodes, posing serious threats to the ecological environment and human health. The rapid development of CO2 mineralization technology for industrial solid wastes offers a promising solution to ENCAPSULATE CO2 while stabilizing wastes. However, unlike desirable natural silicate minerals like olivine and wollastonite, industrial solid wastes exhibit a complex and diverse composition. The efficiency of mineralization in the carbonation process can be significantly impacted by the competitiveness of impurities relative to Ca/Mg. Whereas, the correlated systematic assessments of impurities' competitiveness remain lacking. In addition, the leachability of potentially toxic elements after mineralization has not been explored, raising significant safety concerns. ENCAPSULATE takes an interdisciplinary approach, combining the researchers experience in waste characterization and thermodynamic modeling with the supervisors expertise in interfacial geochemistry and molecular modeling to address these hitherto neglected challenges head-on. To this end, ENCAPSULATE will establish publicly available datasets and novel models to (i) estimate the impurities constraints on mineralization efficiency at the outset, (ii) propose possible strategies to reduce the environmental impacts of using carbonized products in practical applications and (iii) link CO2 emission to specific activities in industries. The outcomes will benefit EU organizations and industrial stakeholders engaged in CO2 mitigation efforts. The fellowship will be carried out at Universit Grenoble Alpes (ISTerre joint research unit) and work with both academics (PSI, ESRF, CNRS, and EMPA) and industry partners (AMIII). The supervisors' expertise and the organizations' equipment ensure successful research progress and unsurpassed academic-industry intercommunication.