Separation of 3 He Isotope from Liquid Helium with the Use of Entropy Filter Composed of Carbon Nanotubes

Jakub Niechciał, Wojciech Kempiński, Leszek Stobiński, Zbigniew Trybuła, Piotr Banat, Maciej Chorowski, Jarosław Poliński, Katarzyna Chołast and Andrzej Kociemba
Additional contact information
Jakub Niechciał: Institute of Molecular Physics, Polish Academy of Sciences, 60-179 Poznań, Poland
Wojciech Kempiński: Institute of Molecular Physics, Polish Academy of Sciences, 60-179 Poznań, Poland
Leszek Stobiński: Faculty of Chemical and Process Engineering, Warsaw University of Technology, 00-645 Warszawa, Poland
Zbigniew Trybuła: Institute of Molecular Physics, Polish Academy of Sciences, 60-179 Poznań, Poland
Piotr Banat: Institute of Molecular Physics, Polish Academy of Sciences, 60-179 Poznań, Poland
Maciej Chorowski: Department of Cryogenics and Aerospace Engineering, Wroclaw University of Science and Technology, 50-370 Wrocław, Poland
Jarosław Poliński: Department of Cryogenics and Aerospace Engineering, Wroclaw University of Science and Technology, 50-370 Wrocław, Poland
Katarzyna Chołast: Polish Oil and Gas Company—Odolanów, 63-430 Odolanów, Poland
Andrzej Kociemba: Polish Oil and Gas Company—Odolanów, 63-430 Odolanów, Poland

Energies, 2021, vol. 14, issue 20, 1-10

Abstract: The 3 He isotope finds applications in many areas of science and industry, the most important of which are cryogenics, where 3 He allows for achieving millikelvins in dilution refrigerators, and public security with 3 He detectors of radioactive materials at airports and important buildings. 3 He is also used in medicine for lung tomography. One of the most extraordinary future applications is the use of 3 He in fusion reactors for clean energy. 3 He is currently very expensive, with prices reaching USD 2750 for 1 liter of gas in normal conditions; thus, more effort is put into finding economically viable methods to acquire this isotope. The article shows research results of acquiring the 3 He isotope from liquid helium by a quantum separation method with the use of entropy filters based on new carbon nanomaterials: purified multiwall carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) and purified multiwall carbon nanotubes decorated with ZrO 2 nanoparticles. MWCNTs were bundled and applied in the form of pressed tablets with fixed sizes. The research was conducted at the low-temperature region, where helium exhibits its quantum properties by undergoing a phase transition to the superfluid phase at the lambda temperature: T λ = 2.18 K. Entropy filters work below this temperature.

Keywords: entropy filter; carbon nanotubes; quantum filtration; isotope separation; 3He isotope (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/14/20/6832/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/14/20/6832/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jeners:v:14:y:2021:i:20:p:6832-:d:659598

Access Statistics for this article

Energies is currently edited by Ms. Agatha Cao

More articles in Energies from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().