Design and study of dense-skin gas/liquid contactors for carbon dioxide capture - A milestone in the intensification of afterburner capture

Abstract: The design of a new type of membrane contactor and the characterization of its efficiency for the capture of CO ₂ from post-combustion fumes were carried out as part of an ANR research project. This is a hollow-fiber gas/liquid contactor having as its interface a dense polymer skin, supported by a microporous structure. Tested as modules containing a bundle of hollow fibers, capture efficiency was characterized with a model CO ₂ /N ₂ mixture in the presence of an absorbent aqueous monoethanolamine solution circulating on the calender side. Contactor material transfer was modeled using the series resistance approach. Simulation under conditions close to industrial reality shows that it is possible to achieve an intensification factor in moles of CO ₂ captured per m- ³ .s- ¹ of at least four compared with packed columns, while at the same time having greater flexibility of use.

Abstract: The design of a new type of membrane contactor and characterization of its efficiency in CO ₂ capture from post combustion flue gas was carried out in the frame of an ANR research project. An innovative gas/liquid contactor having a dense polymer skin supported by a microporous structure as interface was set up. Assembled as hollow fibers bundles inserted into a module, the capture efficiency of this system was characterized using a CO ₂ /N ₂ mixture model in the presence of an absorbing aqueous solution of monoethanolamine in the shell side. The mass transfer of these dense membrane contactors was mathematically modeled using the resistance-in-series approach; through simulations close to industrial cases, the results showed that it is possible to achieve an intensification factor of the CO ₂ absorption in mol. m- ³ .s- ¹ of at least four compared to conventional column absorbers while having greater operating flexibility.

Keywords: gas/liquid contactor, polymer membrane, modeling-simulation, CO ₂ capture, wetting, intensification

Keywords: gas/liquid contactor, polymeric membrane, modeling-simulation, CO ₂ capture, wetting, intensification