Abstract
The development of a portable oxygen concentrator is of prime significance for patients with respiratory problems. This paper presents a portable concentrator prototype design using the pressure/vacuum swing adsorption (PVSA) cycle with a deep evacuation step (−0.82 barg) instead of desorption with purge flow to simplify the oxygen production process. The output of the oxygen concentrator is a ~90 vol % enriched oxygen stream in a continuous adsorption and desorption cycle (cycle time ~90 s). The size of the adsorption column is 3 cm in diameter and 20 cm in length. A Li+ exchanged 13X nanosize zeolite is used as the adsorbent to selectively adsorb nitrogen from air. A dynamic model of the pressure and vacuum swing adsorption units was developed to study the pressurization and depressurization process inside the microporous area of nanosized zeolites. The describing equations were solved using COMSOL Multiphysics Chemical Engineering module. The output flow rate and oxygen concentration results from the simulation model were compared with the experimental data. Velocity and concentration profiles were obtained to study the adsorption process and optimize the operational parameters.
Highlights
Air pollution is becoming a worldwide problem in heavily populated cities like Beijing, Los Angeles, and Mexico City
Oxygen concentration techniques are based on air separation processes such as cryogenic technique, membrane separation and pressure swing adsorption (PSA) that can effectively produce enriched oxygen using ambient air as the source
Cryogenic distillation acts as the leading process for air separation in an industrial oxygen plant, the pressure swing adsorption (PSA) technique has the advantage of reducing energy consumption for small production scales
Summary
Air pollution is becoming a worldwide problem in heavily populated cities like Beijing, Los Angeles, and Mexico City. Portable pressure swing adsorption oxygen concentrators have been designed and developed in the past two decades due to the synthesis of more effective zeolites with higher gas adsorption capacity and selectivity. For on-site medical grade oxygen production, a cylinder gas source or several powerful air compressors are usually installed for the rapid pressure swing adsorption process to maintain the productivity of high purity oxygen stream [9,10,11]. We compare the performance of a portable miniature PVSA oxygen concentrator unit with two adsorption columns, an air compressor, four solenoid valves and a back-pressure regulator (total weight less than 2 kg) built in our laboratory with the simulation results under modified Montgareuil and Domine cycle using COMSOL Multiphysics Chemical Engineering module. The oxygen concentrator unit can provide a ~90 vol % enriched oxygen stream to meet the concentration requirement of medical-grade oxygen
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