CO2 solubility and amine volatility data for low-concentration solutions of MEA, AMP, PZ and CESAR-1 blend (AMP/PZ)

Abstract

Water-wash section(s) effectively reduce amine compound emissions in amine-based carbon capture processes. Reliable predictions of the behavior of these emission control technologies depend on detailed understanding of the vapor-liquid equilibrium (VLE) of water wash system. However, existing vapor-liquid equilibrium data in the literature focus primarily on solvent-like amine concentrations in amine–CO2–H2O systems; hence, new low-concentration VLE data are needed. In this work, the CO2 solubility in low-concentration solutions of monoethanolamine (MEA), piperazine (PZ), 2-amino-2-methyl-1-propanol (AMP), and AMP/PZ blend (CESAR-1) was investigated for temperatures between 303 and 353 K at atmospheric pressure. Additionally, amine volatility measurements for CO2-loaded low-concentration solutions of MEA, PZ, AMP and CESAR-1 were performed in the range of 313–373 K and 8–96 kPa. Overall, the data show that the CO2 partial pressure increases with increasing CO2 loading and temperature. Similarly, the amine partial pressure increases with increasing pressure and temperature. The new experimental data were compared with two existing VLE models using electrolyte non-random two-liquid activity coefficient models to evaluate the ability of the latter to predict vapor-liquid equilibrium behavior. Both CO2 solubility and amine volatility predictions by the models tend to show significant deviations. The comparison highlight the need for such low-concentration data for all systems studied. This data shall serve to improve existing water-wash modeling tools.