Development of an innovative process for post-combustion CO2 capture to produce high-value NaHCO3 nanomaterials

Abstract

• An innovative process using SG for CO 2 capture from flue gas was developed in aspen plus v.10. • The flue gas flow rate used in the process was 44.75 tph and contained 0.0023 mol% SO 2 and 13.33 mol% CO 2 . • The process was designed to remove all SO 2 , and capture 90 mol% of CO 2 from the flue gas to produce valuable NaHCO 3 nanoparticles. • The hydraulics and mass transfer of the gas-liquid systems were obtained and the CAPEX, OPEX, and LCOC of the process were calculated. • The process was able to capture 8.144 tph of CO 2 and produce 15.545 tph of NaHCO 3 nanoparticles. An innovative post-combustion process using aqueous sodium glycinates solutions (SGS) for CO 2 capture from a split flue gas stream emitted from the 600 MWe coal power plant, used in the Wolverine Clean Energy Venture (WCEV) project, was developed in Aspen Plus v.10. The flue gas flow rate used in the process was 12.43 kg/s (at 353.15 K and 101.33 kPa) and contained 0.0023 and 13.33 mol% of SO 2 and CO 2 , respectively. The overall process includes 5 main units designed to remove all SO 2 and capture more than 90 mol% of CO 2 in the flue gas stream, while producing high-value, salable sodium bicarbonate (NaHCO 3 ) nanomaterials to offset the total process costs. The hydraulics, mass transfer characteristics, and process performance obtained using Aspen Plus were discussed. Also, the capital expenditure (CAPEX), operating expenditure (OPEX), and Levelized cost of CO 2 capture (LCOC) were calculated to assess the feasibility of this process. The hydraulics in the SO 2 washing and CO 2 capture units showed a pressure drop of 12 and 1 kPa, respectively, and the behaviors of the liquid holdup and normalized packing specific wetted surface area were similar in both units. The gas-side mass transfer coefficients were orders of magnitude greater than the liquid-side mass transfer coefficients. The process was able to capture 2.352 kg/s of CO 2 and produce 4.486 kg/s of valuable NaHCO 3 nanomaterials. Also, the calculated CAPEX, OPEX, and LCOC of the process for a 30-year plant lifetime were ($4,450,552), (233.00 $/h) and (35.49 $/ton of CO 2 captured), respectively.