CFD modeling on the chemical absorption of CO2 in a microporous tube-in-tube microchannel reactor

In this paper, combining recently developed mesoscale mass transfer model with reaction kinetics, the chemical absorption process of CO2 by MEA solution in a microporous tube-in-tube microchannel reactor (MTMCR) was numerically simulated for the first time. The predicted values by CFD simulations were in agreement with the public experimental data (Na-Na Gao et al., Ind. Eng. Chem. Res., 2011). The distributions of CO2 removal efficiency and volumetric mass transfer coefficient under different gas flow rate, solvent flow rate, solvent temperature, and MEA concentration were analyzed. Among these factors, MEA concentration had a more significant influence on the CO2 chemical absorption. The K(G)a in the MTMCR was more than 200 times of that in the randomly packed bed under the similar operating conditions. The local mass transfer rate of chemical absorption was one order of magnitude higher than that of physical absorption. This research work could lay a theoretical foundation for the simulation of the complex gas-liquid systems including the chemical absorption by CFD method.

Automated summary

This paper numerically simulated the chemical absorption process of CO2 by MEA solution in a microporous tube-in-tube microchannel reactor (MTMCR) using a mesoscale mass transfer model and reaction kinetics. The study found that MEA concentration had a significant influence on CO2 absorption, and the mass transfer coefficient in MTMCR was significantly higher than in a randomly packed bed. Overall, this research lays a theoretical foundation for simulating complex gas-liquid systems using the CFD method.