Shaping of advanced materials for CO2 capture processes

Carbon capture and storage (CCS) is one of the technological solutions to decarbonize the energy market while providing secure energy supply. So far, the cost of CCS is dominated by the cost of the CO2 capture process, reason why innovative capture techniques should be developed. Adsorption techniques are under demonstration for pre-combustion CO2 capture using commercial materials. Other adsorption-based technologies are being studied for post-combustion techniques and their main limitation is the lack of existence of shaped materials with high selectively and cyclic loading of CO2 that can be used in process development and demonstration. The main objective of this project is to develop cutting-edge adsorption technologies for capturing CO2 from pre- and post-combustion streams. Adsorption processes have to be optimized in terms of materials and also on its engineering. A myriad of materials with exceptional properties to employ adsorption techniques for CO2 capture have been discovered in the last 30 years. Example of one such material class is metal-organic frameworks (MOFs). The main limitation to evaluate these materials has been their availability and the "shaping technology", which is currently in its infancy. SINTERCAP has developed novel reactor concepts based on additive manufacturing that were used to scale-up synthesis of metal-organic frameworks. Formulation of pellets with alginate methods is also used for this purpose. Novel extrusion recipes were developed to generate MOF monoliths and we have also explored the possibility of making 3D printed structures. Advanced process engineering models of adsorption units were used to simulate multi-column PSA units for simultaneous hydrogen production and CO2 capture using standard materials as reference and novel UTSA-16 extrudates as selective CO2 adsorbent. The optimization of PSA processes with respect to energy consumption has demonstrated potential for CO2 capture from new pre-combustion schemes performing capture of CO2 and purification of hydrogen at higher pressure.

The project has contributed to help our department build up significant expertise in scaling up and shaping of MOFs. These materials are very selective towards CO2 according to many publications, but most of the research done is in the milligram-gram level. Shaping into really usable particles is something that is rarely done by most people In this project, we have extended the synthesis into kilogram-scale by batch and by continuous methods using reactors produced by 3D printing. We have also developed three diffeernt methods for shaping MOF materials: pelletization using alginates, extrusion and 3D printing. For post-combustion, the techniques and materials used have not proven to be very efficient with higher energy consumption and particularly a large footprint. The adsorbents evaluated in this project are good for bulk separation. Indeed, a cobalt-based MOF termed UTSA-16 is very suitable for simultaneous purification of H2 with CO2-capture.

Carbon capture and storage (CCS) is one of the technological solutions to decarbonize the energy market while providing secure energy supply. So far, the cost of CCS is dominated by the cost of the CO2 capture process, reason why innovative capture techni ques should be developed. Adsorption techniques are under demonstration for pre-combustion CO2 capture using commercial materials. Other adsorption-based technologies are being studied for post-combustion techniques and their main limitation is the existe nce of shaped materials with high selectively and cyclic loading of CO2 that can be used in process development and demonstration. On the other side, a myriad of materials with exceptional properties to employ adsorption techniques for CO2 capture has bee n discovered in the last 30 years. Example of such materials are metal-organic frameworks (MOFs). The main limitation to evaluate these materials has been their "shaping technology", which is currently in its infancy. The main objective of this project is to develop cutting-edge adsorption technologies for capturing CO2 from pre and post-combustion streams. Our goal is to develop processes that can severely cut the energy consumption of the CO2 capture with minimal environmental effects and footprint. In order to achieve such objective, one of the main activities within the project is to shape MOF materials into usable structures: particles that can be used in Pressure Swing Adsorption (PSA) processes for pre-combustion capture and honeycomb monoliths tha t can be used in adsorption processes for post-combustion CO2 capture, avoiding significant pressure drop through the columns. The technology developed in the project will be benchmarked against current technology and options of energetic integration will also be evaluated.