Design And Demonstration Of A 10 Kg CO2/day DAC Pilot Facility Using Sorbent Circulation

Abstract

Direct Air Capture (DAC) is an indispensable technology when targeting to mitigate climate effects caused by the increasing CO2 levels in the earth’s atmosphere. Later, it may become essential for providing society with renewable carbon for chemicals, fuels and materials. Adsorption based DAC-processes, nowadays carried out in fixed bed contactors, may benefit significantly from sorbent circulation concepts in terms of economy of scale, energy consumption and optimizing the design for adsorption and desorption independently. In this work, a unique DAC pilot unit (design capacity 10 kg CO2/day) based on sorbent circulation is designed, constructed, commissioned and tested. Novel is, next to applying sorbent circulation for DAC, especially the sectionalized regeneration section, designed to serve specific functions. Furthermore, an innovative method to reduce water coadsorption is presented. In this work design considerations, issues encountered during commissioning and first results of this pilot unit are presented, as well as results from the first, outdoor, experimental campaign.

Keywords: Direct Air Capture, DAC, pilot plant, sorbent, design, CO2, water