Experimental Study of Breakthrough Adsorption on Activated Carbon for CO<sub>2</sub> Capture

Abstract

In this study, a commercial activated carbon was assessed as adsorbent for post-combustion CO 2 capture. The breakthrough adsorption experiments were conducted in a fixed-bed column with simulated flue gas of 12% CO 2 . The effects of feed flow rate and adsorption pressure on breakthrough time and CO 2 adsorption capacity were evaluated. The column efficiency was introduced to estimate the percentage of the utilization of the bed adsorbent capacity. At a higher flow rate, the breakthrough time, breakthrough capacity and column efficiency decreased. Conversely, increasing adsorption pressure was favorable to CO 2 adsorption by the increase in breakthrough time, CO 2 adsorption capacity and the column efficiency. During the experiments, temperature changes were detected at three positions inside the column to track the movement of breakthrough front.