The postcombustion separation of CO(2) from a flue gas mixture is a unit operation in carbon capture. Today, CO(2) is normally separated with alkanolamines in aqueous solutions. These absorption processes are energy intensive and costly. Increased environmental considerations and the significant footprints of many energy sources warrant the development of new gas separation techniques for the competitive implementation of carbon capture and storage technologies. Improved adsorbent-mediated separation processes are candidates for such new low-energy low-cost processes. In this study, porous silica-based adsorbents with amine-like motifs were synthesized. The temperature- and pressure-dependent adsorption of CO(2) and CO(2)/H(2)O mixtures were determined and compared for these materials. The experimental uptake capacities of the materials modified with primary propyl amine moieties were significantly higher than those of materials modified with bis-ethanol amine or amidine. The propyl-amine-modified samples also showed good selectivity for CO(2) over nitrogen gas. (C) 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.