Asbestos Waste Carbonation: a new asbestos treatment with CO2 recovery

For several years in many countries industrial processes for carbon dioxide permanently capture have been investigating by solid state or in solution reactions using precursor materials and CO2 fluxes captured from industrial plants or in the atmosphere. The paper reports a new preparation process of materials made of magnesium oxide, magnesium hydroxide and magnesium carbonate starting from materials containing asbestos from natural sources (serpentine with chrysotile, ophiolites with amphiboles and asbestos of serpentine) through the use of mechanochemical high-energy mills. In the work we discuss the aspects related to the materials to be used, the mechanical activation parameters and the carbonation system in order to optimize the process and reduce the treatment costs. The method identified leads to the preparation of precursor materials usable in many chemical carbon dioxide capture process and as absorbent and dehydrating materials.