Physicochemical properties of Al-pillared montmorillonite doped with 12-tungstophosphoric acid

Bentonite a natural raw material from the Sipovo mining deposits (Republic of Srpska), which contains a high percentage of montmorillonite, was treated to obtain montmorillonite clay ready for further investigations. Al-pillared montmorillonite was doped with 12-tungstophosphoric acid (WPA) by the sol-gel method. Substantial increase in proton conductivity of this new material was achieved. Different physicochemical methods were used to characterize new materials such as X-ray powder diffraction (XRD), thermogravimetric (TG) analysis, porosity measurements, scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and infrared measurements (IR). Impedance spectroscopy technique was applied in order to study the proton conductivity and its dependence on the frequency and tungstophosphoric acid concentration.