Sustainable zeolite synthesis: advances in green strategies and AI-assisted design
Abstract
Zeolites are porous materials with regular nanochannels, high surface area, tunable acid sites, excellent thermal and hydrothermal stability, and outstanding catalytic performance. These properties make them indispensable in energy and chemical engineering, environmental remediation, selective adsorption, and clean energy technologies. However, conventional hydrothermal synthesis suffers from high energy consumption, strong alkali corrosion, excessive template usage, and the generation of salt containing and organic waste liquids, limiting its sustainability. Consequently, green chemistry based synthesis strategies have become a major research focus, aiming to optimize resource utilization, environmental impact, and material performance simultaneously. This review summarizes recent advances in green zeolite synthesis, including solvent free or low solvent methods, low template or template free strategies, directed agent synthesis, ionothermal synthesis, dry gel conversion, and the use of renewable silicon and aluminum resources. The underlying reaction mechanisms and performance control principles are critically discussed. Through representative case studies, the review highlights how these approaches reduce activation energy, improve atom efficiency, minimize waste generation, and enable precise control of crystal morphology and pore structures. Future perspectives include AI-driven materials design, accurate topology prediction, machine learning-assisted structural characterization and generation, and the optimization of synthesis conditions.