Application of Free Piston Stirling Cooler (SC) on CO2 Capture Process

Abstract

CO2 emission from large point sources (such as coal-fired power plant, cement and steel industry) has attracted a wide attention. During the mature available capture techniques, amine scrubbing approach has been utilized as the most successful one. Nevertheless, the energy penalty of regeneration and degradation of solvents are the main bottlenecks that limit the improvement of the capture efficiency. In this study, a novel application of free piston Stirling cooler (SC) on cryogenic CO2 capture process has been described. In the developed system, the CO2 in the gas stream can be captured in solid form under the cryogenic condition, and frosted on the cold head of SC. In order to avoid the adverse influence of frost layer, a scrapper is added beside the cold head of SC to scrap the deposited CO2 timely. Furthermore, the fallen CO2 crystals is gathered and preserved for further utilization. Compared to other cryogenic sources, the advantage of SC are high efficiency, environmental friendly, safe and convenient. The aim of this paper is to evaluate the properties of the novel system and implement a brief comparison of performance with other cryogenic method.