Performance assessment of 1TPD post combustion CO2capture with coal combustion

*Muhammad Akram, Janos Szuhanszki, Kris Milkowski,Bill Nimmo, Mohammed Pourkashanian

University of Sheffield, Western Bank, Sheffield, S10 2TN

Abstract for oral presentation:

This paper presents results of an experimental campaign carried out at the Pilot Scale Advanced Capture Technology (PACT) facilities of the UK Carbon Capture and Storage Research Centre (UKCCSRC). A 0.25MWsolid fuel Combustion Test Facility (CTF) is integrated with a post combustion carbon capture plant of one Ton per day CO2 capture capacity.The CTF comprises of down-fired furnace fitted with a scaled version of a commercial low-NOx burner. The flue gas generated is drawn through a cyclone separator and a high temperature candle filter for fine particulate removal by an induced draught fan. A slip stream of theflue gasis taken by the capture plant for CO2 absorption.The absorption tower (8 m height x 0.3 m dia.) of the capture plantis packed with state of the art high performance Mellapak CC3 packing manufactured by Sulzer. Monoethanolamine (30%) was used as solvent at varied flow rates. Hot water pressurized to 4 bar and heated to a temperature in the range of 115–120°C was used for heating up the solvent for stripping CO2.

The performance of the capture plant in terms of reboiler duty, capture rate, loading capacity and liquid to gas ratio is evaluated at different operating conditions.Absorbeption column temperature profile is developed by 10 RTDs installed around 48cm apart along the column length. Performance of the absorption column as indicated by rich and lean solvent CO2 loadings, measured by titration methods, is discussed. Moreover, emissions of solvent and some of the degradation products leaving with the exhaust gas from the capture plant are monitored using FTIRand reported.The emissions are measured by a 5 point measurement system at Flue Gas Desulphurisation (FGD) inlet, absorber inlet, absorber outlet, wash column outlet and stripper outlet (high purity CO2).The results are compared with gas firing conditions (low CO2 concentration). Energy balance on the stripper has shown that steam generation rate and condenser duty increases with increase in CO2 concentrations.

Keywords: Post combustion, CCS, coal, reboiler duty, capture rate

Acknowledgement: The authors would like to acknowledge the financial support of the UK Engineering and Physical SciencesResearch Council (EPSRC). The authors would like to acknowledge the UK CCS Research Centre( for making their Pilot-scale Advanced Capture Technology (PACT) facilities available forthe research. The UKCCSRC is funded by the EPSRC as part of the Research Council UK (RCUK) EnergyProgramme.

* Corresponding author:

e-mail:

Tel: +44 114 2223655