Experimental investigation on CO2 post-combustion capture by indirect thermal swing adsorption using 13X and 5A zeolites

Experimental results of CO2 post-combustion capture for a TSA process including an internal heat-exchanger (indirect heating/cooling) are presented. The comparative experimental study is carried out on 13X and 5A zeolites, with a mixture 90% N-2-10% CO2 modeling the flue gas. With 5A zeolite having given the best performances, we tested it with various operating conditions including one with nitrogen purge during desorption. This one showed a good compromise between CO2 capture rate, purity of the desorbate, volumetric productivity, and specific-heat consumption. We obtained a volumetric productivity of 37 kg(CO2)/m(ads)(3)center dot h and a specific-heat consumption of 6 MJ/kg(CO2) at our laboratory scale and 4.5 MJ/kg(CO2) for the adiabatic estimate (in the same order of magnitude as those obtained industrially with the reference MEA amine process). These results are promising because our process is not optimized yet and the scale-up on an industrial version involves a reduction in specific-heat consumption.