Catalyst Development for Rate Enhanced Acid Gas (CO2) Scrubbing

A recent rule from the EPA would require that any new fossil fuel plant larger than 25 MW would be limited to 1100 pounds of CO2 per megawatt hour of electricity generated. Consequently, these increased regulations on CO2 emissions dictate the need for improved carbon capture technologies. Among the most common methods available for carbon capture are amine based absorbents in aqueous solvents due to their purity of CO2 product stream and effectiveness of CO2 removal from dilute fluid streams. However, this process results in a significant energy penalty and cost of electricity increase compared to a non-CO2 capture case. In order to reduce the cost associated with post-combustion carbon capture new strategies are needed that will reduce the large capital and operational cost.
UKy-CAER is developing a catalyst capable of reducing these large capital investment and energy demands through enhanced rates of carbon capture. A family of catalyst has been developed that are water, air, and thermally stable as well as soluble under conditions conducive to carbon capture. This new family of catalyst show significant improvement in mass transfer over un-catalyzed solutions. For example, a rate enhancement of > 30% is observed in 30 wt% MEA solutions. Further experiments have shown the broad applicability of the developed solvents in various CO2 capture solvents. This allows for the utilization of solvents and/or solvent blends that will reduce operational cost downstream without having a prohibitive capital cost.