Evaluation of the DMX Process for Industrial Pilot Demonstration – Methodology and Results

Abstract

Abstract The SP3 Subproject of the OCTAVIUS EU FP7 project was dedicated to the demonstration of the DMX CO2 capture process, developed by IFP Energies nouvelles (IFPEN) and licensed by PROSERNAT, on the 3.5 MWe equivalent industrial pilot of ENEL at Brindisi. The DMX process is based on the particular property of demixing solvents to form, for specific CO2 loadings and temperature conditions, two immiscible liquid phases. The light phase being almost free of CO2, only the high capacity heavy phase is sent to the stripper, which makes possible energy savings but also requires an adapted process flow scheme and extra equipment. Prior to launch the corresponding retrofit and perform the pilot tests, two conditions were settled. First, a quantitative evaluation of the process must show a significant interest in comparison with the benchmark MEA 30 wt.%. To evaluate this first conditions, 24 criteria were considered. Second, an acceptable cost for the retrofit of the existing industrial pilot, determined from a Front End Engineering and Design (FEED) study must be obtained. Most of this paper deals with the evaluation of these two conditions which ended in November 2013 and a small section is dedicated to the FEED study. It is shown that most of the parameters considered for the process evaluation are in good agreement with the initial targets. The proposed evaluation methodology could be used for any new process prior to demonstration.