Review of design correlations for CO2 absorption into MEA using structured packings

A good knowledge of design correlations is essential to provide the best possible scale-up data in order to know and remove technical risks related to the design and operation of a full scale CO2 capture plant. Hydrodynamics and mass transfer correlations for structured packed columns have been compared for two cases: absorption of CO2 from gas-fired power plants and absorption of CO2 from coal-fired plants to take account of the impact of operating conditions and hydraulics of a packed column in a large scale CO2 capture plant. The study showed that there is a large uncertainty associated with applying the proposed correlations in a large scale of packed column. The uncertainty can be explained by three main factors: (i) the model which correlations developed is based on; (ii) the data for development and verification of the models, and (iii) the calculation approach which is related to mathematical expressions (complexity of the model).

► We review and compare hydrodynamics and mass transfer correlations for structured packed columns.
► We apply the correlations for CO2 absorption from coal-fired and gas-fired power plants by MEA.
► Some important features discuss for moving from small scale to commercial scale of CO2 capture plants.