Ca looping technology: current status, developments and future directions

Calcium looping technology is a promising new technique for high-temperature scrubbing of CO2 from flue gas and syngases. Current economic projections suggest it might be able to capture CO2 at costs of similar to$20/ton of avoided CO2. Nonetheless there are questions about the long-term behavior of natural sorbents in such systems, and there is substantial R&D being done on this technology worldwide to answer questions about whether the performance of natural sorbents can be improved, or whether it would be better to use synthetic ones. The current period is particularly interesting as the first pilot plants and demonstration units capable of operating continuously are now coming on stream, and if successful these will lead to large-scale industrial demonstrations of the technology in the next 10 to 15 years. (c) 2011 Society of Chemical Industry and John Wiley & Sons. Ltd