New Configuration of the CO₂ Capture Process Using Aqueous Monoethanolamine for Coal-Fired Power Plants

Abstract

Postcombustion CO2 capture with aqueous monoethanolamine (MEA) scrubbing is one of the most promising and well-proven techniques for reducing CO2 emissions into the atmosphere. However, this process has a critical problem: the high reboiler heat energy requirement for solvent regeneration at the stripper reboiler. To reduce the reboiler heat requirement, this paper suggests a new stripper configuration for CO2 capture with MEA, namely a combined rich vapor recompression (RVR) and cold solvent split (CSS). The RVR is a newly developed configuration, involving vaporizing a cold solvent in the heat exchanger, thereby maximizing the heat exchanger preheating duty under low pressure. The CSS is a well-known configuration, feeding the split cold solvent to the stripper top and eliminating the reflux rate in the stripper by cooling the stripper top. The RVR process is dramatically improved when it is combined with the CSS configuration. To show the effect of this combined process, this study includes simulation of the Base process and of five alternative processes and also comparisons with reported data. A base model was established based on the operating data from a 0.1 MW pilot plant in South Korea. Consequently, the reboiler heat requirement in the combined the RVR and CSS process was reduced from 3.44 MJth/kg CO2 to 2.75 MJth/kg CO2. The total equivalent energy requirement for CO2 capture and the compression process was reduced from 1.224 MJe/kg CO2 to 1.150 MJe/kg CO2. This combined configuration reduced the total equivalent work by up to 6.0% compared with the conventional MEA process and was 1.7–3.4% lower than that of the lean vapor recompression (LVR) process, which is a well-known advanced MEA process.

Aqueous Biphasic Systems for the Synthesis of Formates by Catalytic CO2 Hydrogenation: Integrated Reaction and Catalyst Separation for CO2‐Scrubbing Solutions

“…These solvents are all regarded as industrially acceptable according to the solvent selection guidelines . Dimethylamine, triethylamine, and monoethanolamine (MEA), as a prototypical example of a scrubbing amine applied on commercial scale, were used as the amine components.…”

“…These very positive results prompted us to study the integrated hydrogenation and product separation with aqueous MEA solutions as used in large scale applications for postcombustion CO 2 capture . To this end, the use of an aqueous solution of MEA at a loading of around 20 wt %, which was pre‐saturated with CO 2 at low overpressures, was examined as feedstock for direct hydrogenation (Table )…”

Investigation of hydrodynamic performance and effective mass transfer area for Sulzer DX structured packing

“…The MEA solution was loaded by bubbling pure CO 2 gas to obtain the desired CO 2 loading. The concentrations of aqueous NaOH and MEA solution and the CO 2 loading were confirmed by titration against 1.0 mol/L HCl solution using methyl orange as indicator . The properties of these solutions were tabulated in Table .…”

Design of organic structure directing agents to control the synthesis of zeolites for carbon capture and storage

“… 1 The most mature CSS technology currently is scrubbing the CO 2 produced in the fuel combustion process with aqueous monoethanolamine. 2 This process is highly energy consuming. 3 Therefore alternative technologies, including adsorption of CO 2 in nanoporous materials such as zeolites and metal–organic frameworks, are the subject of numerous studies.…”