https://doi.org/10.1016/j.egypro.2017.03.1277
“The experiments were performed in a bench scale full cycle CO2 capture pilot plant shown in Fig. 1. The
absorption and regeneration columns were made of stainless steel with an inside diameter of 0.05 m and height of
1.50 m. Both absorber and desorber were insulated by owens corn fiberglass. The model for absorber and desorber
are shown in Fig. 2. There are six gas sampling channels on one side and six thermocouple channels on the opposite
side along the absorber column height. Each channel is 0.021 m height. Between the channels, stainless steel LDX
Sulzer structured packing with outside diameter of 0.047 m provided by Sulzer Chemtech Ltd. was installed. Unlike
the absorber, the desorber was divided into five sections of packing. The top and bottom sections, which were 0.20
m in height and were packed with LDX Sulzer structured packing. The second and the forth sections were 0.025 m
tall loaded with 0.01 m diameter inert beads. The middle section was a ca talyst bed containing catalysts and inert
beads with diameter of 0.006 m. There were 6 thermocouples installed along the desorber. The amines used were 5
M, 5 M MEA/ 2 M MDEA and 5 M MEA/ 1.25 M DEAB.
During the experiments, 15 SLPM of 15% CO2 in N2 was fed to the water saturator (1 L gas washing bottle,
Chemglass Life Sciences, CA) then introduced to the bottom of the absorption column. The lean amine from the
amine tank (4L LDPE bottle, Nalgene) was pumped with a flow rate of 60 mL/min to the top of the absorber to
counter-currently contact with the gas which allowed absorption to take place. Then the rich amine leaves the
absorber from the bottom. The off gas flows out from the top of the column to the water condenser and dryer. The
off gas composition was measured by a CO2 analyzer (NOVA analytical system Inc.) and recorded. The rich amine
coming out from the absorber was pumped to the lean-rich heater exchanger (plate heat exchanger, Alfa Laval Corp)
in order to be preheated by the hot lean amine. After that, the warm rich MEA is passed through hot water heat
exchanger (plate heat exchanger, Alfa Laval Corp). At this point, the MEA solution was heated, and then enters the
top of the regenerator where the CO2 is stripped out from the solution. The captured CO2 exited the top of the
regeneration column to a condenser. The lean amine drained at the bottom of the regenerator passed through the
lean-rich amine heat exchanger and went back to the amine tank. After the system reached steady state, both rich
and lean amines, inlet and outlet gas composition, and CO2 production rate were taken for analysis of concentration
and CO2 loading by titration method.”
