CO2 Absorption/Desorption in Aqueous Single and Novel Hybrid Solvents of Glycerol and Monoethanolamine in a Pilot-Scale Packed Bed Column

• Published in: Energy & fuels 2020-07, Vol.34 (7), p.8503-8515
• Main Authors: Mirzaei, Somayeh, Shamiri, Ahmad, Aroua, Mohamed Kheireddine
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Environmental and Carbon Dioxide Issues
• ISSN: 0887-0624; 1520-5029
• DOI: 10.1021/acs.energyfuels.8b04389

CO2 removal from mixed CO2–N2 gas was investigated by using aqueous solutions of monoethanolamine (MEA) (10 wt %), glycerol (10 wt %), and a mixture of MEA (10 wt %)–glycerol (10 wt %) in a pilot-scale packed column. An Aspen Plus simulator was employed to simulate the CO2–MEA–glycerol process using a rate-based model. Then, the experimental data of the pilot-scale columns were applied to validate the simulation results. The lowest and highest rich CO2 loadings for the MEA solvent were measured in 3.65 and 13.9% mol CO2/mol MEA with 1.4 and 3.9 L/min gas flow rates, respectively. In comparison to the CO2–MEA system, the lowest and highest rich CO2 loadings for the CO2–MEA–glycerol system increased by 42.2 and 14.8%, respectively, under the same conditions. The values of CO2 loadings predicted by the simulation were in concordance with the experimental values. The results showed that the hybrid MEA–glycerol solution had a better CO2 absorption performance than the aqueous MEA solution.