Corrosion in MEA units for CO2 capture: Pilot plant studies

Abstract

Among the technologies that are under study for CO2 capture from flue gas, the separation process using monoethanolamine (MEA) could be the first to be available for immediate industrial applications in the next few years. The principles of CO2 separation using alkanolamines were discovered nearly a century ago. The process has been applied successfully for several decades in areas such as natural gas processing or coal gasification. The application to flue gas treatment was introduced in the early 1980s, but was not widespread. In such industrial processes, corrosion represents one of the major operational problems. For the capture of CO2 from flue gas using MEA, the problem is even more critical since (i) MEA is one of the most corrosive amine when compared to secondary or tertiary amines that are also used for gas sweetening, and (ii) flue gas contains a certain amount of oxygen, which can react with the amine to form corrosive degradation products. In the framework of the CAPRICE project, which is an International cooperation and exchange project supported by the EU, The International Test centre for CO2 Capture from the University of Regina (CA) and IFP (F) have shared their experience on corrosion monitoring from CO2 capture pilot plants. The first pilot plant facility is owned by ITC. It has a capacity to capture 1 ton CO2/day from a natural gas burner. It is equipped with corrosion control instruments and other monitoring systems. The second pilot plant is located in a coal fired power station in Esbjerg (DK). It was built with the financial support of the UE through the CASTOR project under the lead of IFP. It has been in operation since early 2006, and has a capacity of 1.0 ton CO2/hour. It is equipped with weight loss coupons for corrosion evaluation at different locations in the process. This paper presents the major results of corrosion testing from both pilot plants under MEA operation. It appeared from both pilot plants that the areas most susceptible to corrosion were the stripper inlet and outlet, with corrosion rates around 1 mm.year−1 for carbon steel.