The Performance in a Fixed Bed Reactor of Copper-Based Oxides on Titania as Oxygen Carriers for Chemical Looping Combustion of Methane

Abstract

Chemical looping combustion (CLC) of methane has been proposed in the past decade as an efficient method for CO2 capture without important cost penalties. The combustion is carried out in a two-step process using, in the first one, the lattice oxygen of a reducible inorganic oxide for methane combustion and, in the second one, air for further carrier regeneration. An additional advantage of the CLC is the improbable generation of thermal NOx because the operating temperature used for carrier regeneration is relatively low. Copper-based oxygen carriers with different copper contents have been prepared by successive wet impregnations on porous titania, used as support, with an aqueous solution of copper nitrate. The prepared oxygen carriers have been subsequently studied in five-cycle reduction−regeneration tests in a fixed bed reactor at atmospheric pressure with the aim of carrier characterization, analysis of the components in the outlet gas, and the study of the effect of some of the main parameters inf...