Next Gen Carbon Capture Using Energy Efficient Simulated Moving Bed Concept

To meet their net zero goals for carbon emissions, industries are exploring clean and economically viable solutions for de-carbonization of the industrial processes. At present, liquid amine-based technologies are mostly used for carbon capture, however, these technologies face challenges in terms of high cost of CO2 capture ($ 40-$50/ton of CO2), toxic nature of solvents, solvent degradation, losses and its disposal. Considering the above challenges, adsorption-based processes utilizing solid sorbent materials are being explored as a cleaner and economical alternative for CO2 capture from industrial flue gases and even for its direct air capture. In the current work we introduce a novel energy efficient adsorption process leveraging upon advancement in process automation. Present concept mimics ideal counter current gas solid moving bed operation without moving the solid sorbent particles. Being counter current operation with stationary solids, the concept offers a higher gas to solid mass transfer rates to give higher CO2 separation efficiencies, a process with zero solid pumping cost and free from any solid attrition. Further, unique inherent heat recovery and utilization feature of the process in temperature swing adsorption (TSA) mode leads to low sorbent energy requirements which makes the process highly economically viable. To check the performance and efficacy of the concept, an adsorption simulation (ADSIM) model was developed for the process and simulation studies were performed for CO2 capture from refinery flue gases containing 12-15 % CO2 by volume. Results showed more than 90 % CO2 recovery at 95 % CO2 purity for proprietary sorbent material. Further, in temperature swing adsorption (TSA) mode energy requirement for the process estimated to be 0.265 MJ/ kg of CO2 which was found to be 10-15 times lower than solvent regeneration energy required for state of art liquid amine-based technologies. The low sorbent regeneration energy for proposed process is envisaged to bring the CO2 capture cost to $15-$20/ton of CO2 which makes the process highly economically viable. Currently, 1 ton per day (TPD) plant is set up in India and concept is under pilot trials at TRL 5.