Comparison of Performance of Alternative Post Combustion Carbon Capture Processes for a Biogas Fueled Micro Gas Turbine

Abstract

The urgent need to decrease greenhouse gases (GHG) has prompted countries such as the UK and Norway to commit to net zero emissions by 2050 and 2030, respectively. One of the sectors contributing to GHG emissions is agriculture, by approximately 10% in the EU in 2017. GHG reductions in the production side should involve avoidance at source, reduction of emissions and/or removal of those emissions, with the potential for negative emissions by carbon capture. This paper focuses on the utilisation of agricultural waste that can be converted into biogas, such as livestock and crops residues which represent around 37% of GHG emissions by agriculture in the EU. The biogas can be used to produce electricity and heat in a micro gas turbine (MGT). Then, the exhaust gases can be sent to a carbon capture plant. This offers the potential for integration of waste into energy for in-house use in farms and fosters a circular-bioeconomy, where the captured CO2 could be used in greenhouses to grow vegetables. This could even allow the integration of other renewable technologies, since the MGT offers flexible operation for rapid start-up and shut down or intermittency of other technologies such as solar or wind. Current carbon capture processes are very costly at the smaller scales typical of remote communities. The alternative A3C (advanced cryogenic carbon capture) process is much more economical at smaller scales. The A3C separates CO2 from process gas that flows counter-currently with a cold moving bed, where the CO2 desublimes on the surface of bed material as a thin layer of frost. This allows enhanced heat transfer and avoids heavy build-up of frost that reduces severely the heat transfer. The phase change separation process employed by A3C and the large thermal inertia of the separation medium gives good flexibility of capture for load changes and on-off despatch. This study integrates a combined heat and power MGT, Turbec T100, of 100 kWe output. This include developed models for the MGT using characteristics maps for the compressor and turbine and for the cryogenic carbon capture plant, using two software tools, IPSEpro and Aspen Plus, respectively.

Review of Cryogenic Carbon Capture Innovations and Their Potential Applications

“…The drying and precooling stages of CCC systems provide the conditions for the removal of benzene, whilst siloxanes are fully removed simultaneously during the CO 2 removal step [46]. Alternatively to biogas upgrading, biogas could be employed directly in micro gas turbines, and the exhaust gases could be treated by post-combustion carbon capture technologies such as cryogenic carbon capture, which could lead to negative net emissions [47].…”