Richard Reed Kansas State University Solvent Selection and Recycling for Carbon Absorption in a Pulverized Coal Power Plant Richard Reed Kansas State University

Outline of Presentation Literature Review Overview of Fossil Fuel Power plants Overview of Carbon Dioxide Absorption Aspen Flowsheet Results from Simulations The need for Optimization Simulated Annealing Acknowledgements

Overview of Fossil Fuel Power Plants Research and Development Solutions, LLC (RDS), comp. Bituminous Coal and Natural Gas to Electricity Final Report. Tech. no. DOE/NETL-2007/1281. 1st ed. Vol. 1. Print. Cost and Performance Baseline for Fossil Energy Plants.

NGCC produces the cleanest emissions followed by IGCC

NGCC plants are the most efficient followed by IGCC

PC Power plants are selected for the project PC power plants have poor efficiencies and high emissions comparatively 50% of the worlds power is produced by PC power plants Interested in retrofitting current power plants to improve sustainability

Overview of Carbon dioxide absorption Metz, Bert. "Chapter 3 Capture of CO2." IPCC Special Report on Carbon Dioxide Capture and Storage. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2005. Print.

Post Combustion is ideal for retrofitting current power plants Pre-Combustion Difficult to introduce because of components Post Combustion Fits into the end of the process Oxyfuel Burns fuel in pure oxygen producing high temperatures

Post Combustion removes carbon after the combustion of fossil fuels

Aspen Flowsheet

The conceptual design is much simpler than the Aspen flowchart

The Components of the PC power plant are split into three parts

The flue gas is separated into 2 streams before passing through the absorbers Strippers CO2 Recycle Fresh Solvent Inlet Clean Flue Gas CO2 Rich Flue Gas

Chemical or Reactive Absorption Kenig, Eugeny, and Panos Seferlis. "Modeling Reactive Absorption." CEP January (2009): 65-73. Print.

Equilibrium based absorption assumes that each stage in the process is in equilibrium Works well for very fast reactions Less accurate for real absorption processes Equilibrium is seldom reached

Rate-Based models include the actual rates of the mass and energy transfer as well as the reactions Much more accurate Leads to large, complex models Higher computational time

Results from Simulations The Need for Optimization

Effect of Number of Trays on Carbon Absorption and Power Requirement Reflux Ratio:1 MEA: 0.3 by mass fraction Flow plate at tray 2 Incorporates design specification of a 95% absorption of CO2

Effect of Reflux Ratio on Carbon Absorption and Power Requirement Incorporates design specification of a 95% absorption of CO2 Number of Trays: 20 MEA: 0.3 by mass fraction Flow plate at tray 2

Effect of Fraction MEA on Carbon Absorption and Power Requirement Number of Trays: 20 Reflux Ratio: 1 Flow plate at tray 2

Effect of Feed Location on carbon absorption and power requirement Number of Trays: 20 Reflux Ratio: 1 MEA: 0.3 by mass fraction Incorporates design specification of a 95% absorption of CO2

Simulated Annealing Diwekar, Urmila M. "Discrete Optimization." Introduction to Applied Optimization. Norwell, Mass.: Kluwer Academic, 2003. Print.

Simulated annealing is a optimization algorithm which can escape from local min/max

Simulated annealing is a optimization algorithm which can escape from local min/max

Work in Progress Utilizing Simulated Annealing to optimize the absorption section in the PC power plant Incorporation of a second solvent, DEA Mix the solvents MEA and DEA with varying concentrations

Are there any Questions? Acknowledgements Funding provided by The National Science Foundation and Department of Defense, EEC- NSF Grant # 0755115 Research Opportunity provided by the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) Guidance provided by Drs. Diwekar, Jursich, Kotecha, Takoudis and Salazar Are there any Questions?