MXene/PPy Coated Non‐Woven Fabrics of Polypropylene Shaped Fibers: Preparation, Heat Dissipation and Applications in Viscous Oil Spillage Monitoring and Recovery

Developing heatable adsorbents for onsite monitoring and cleanup of viscous oil spills is a crucial but challenging task. Here, the preparation of a super‐hydrophobic heatable absorbent from polypropylene spun‐bound non‐woven fabrics (NWFs) made of fibers with shaped cross‐sections and coated with polypyrrole (PPy) and MXene (H‐MXene/PPy/PEG/PP) is presented. Their structures, heat absorption and dissipation under various heating modes are characterized, and their performance as heatable adsorbents for onsite monitoring and continuous removal of viscous crude oil spills is studied. The impacts of fiber cross sectional shapes, heating mode and operating conditions on the absorbent surface temperature, surface heat dissipating index and capacity, oil monitoring response time (RT), as well as oil absorption capacity and separation efficiency are systematically studied. Shaped cross sectional fibers shows faster oil absorption speed, resulted in shorter RT, faster oil recovery rates and lower surface heating capacity without changing the heat dissipating index. Photo‐heating coupled with Joule heating induces non‐Newtonian irradiative cooling, resulting in an unusually high heat dissipation index of 1.66–2.77. The RT at 1 sun irradiation intensity or 10 voltage is only 54 or 80 s, respectively. Under 1 kW/m 2 , the continuous crude oil recovery rate reaches 176.5 kg·m −2 ·h −1 .