On the determination of surface areas in activated carbons Original Research Article

The paper examines the validity of two approaches frequently used to determine surface areas in activated carbons, namely the BET method and the use of immersion calorimetry. The study is based on 21 well characterized carbons, whose external and microporous surface areas, Se and Smi, have been determined by a variety of independent techniques. It appears clearly that SBET and the real surface area Smi + Se are in agreement only for carbons with average pore widths Lo around 0.8–1.1 nm. Beyond, SBET increases rapidly and SBET − Se is practically the monolayer equivalent of the micropore volume Wo. This confirms that a characterization of