Hybrid induction vacuum swing adsorption, a rapid and fully electrified carbon capture process
Matthias Schoukens, Mohsen Gholami, Gino V. Baron, Tom Van Assche, Joeri Denayer
Abstract
In this study, a fully electrified temperature vacuum swing adsorption (TVSA) was experimentally investigated for adsorbent regeneration in post-combustion carbon capture. To this purpose, consecutive adsorption/electrified-desorption steps were carried out in a fixed bed, packed with composite extrudates of 13X zeolite and Fe3O4 powder, where the heating was performed electrically via induction. Different strategies of simultaneous and sequential heating and evacuation, as well as only heating (TSA) or evacuation (VSA), were applied for adsorbent regeneration. The adsorbate loading, bed pressure, bed temperature, and mole fraction of CO2 at the outlet were chosen as performance indicators. Using only vacuum evacuation, it took 23 times longer (regeneration time) to reach a 90% regeneration level compared to the inductive TVSA process, using one minute of heating at an electrical current of 74.1 A, either before subsequent evacuation or during the beginning of this evacuation. A series of three-minute adsorption-regeneration experiments, in particular VSA and TVSA, were performed to assess the effect of omitting the long cooldown and partial bed regeneration on the subsequent adsorption steps. Over 66% of the total bed capacity could be maintained as working capacity with very short (1 min) heating and (2 min) evacuation times. These are amongst the shortest reported times for thermally assisted regeneration methods of extruded adsorbents.