Environmental and economic evaluation of SO2 recovery in a ceramic hollow fibre membrane contactor

Recovery of sulfur dioxide from gas emissions using a membrane device instead of technology based on dispersive absorption (e.g. scrubbers) is considered as an alternative to reduce environmental impacts and costs associated to solvent losses. The technical viability has been demonstrated in the recent literature but an economic estimation has to be performed in order to evaluate the application of these processes in an industrial scale.This work considers a ceramic hollow fibre membrane contactor as membrane device to recover sulfur dioxide from gas streams. In addition to the technical considerations, environmental and economic issues are discussed in order to include these aspects in the decision making for industrial application. The economic estimation is carried out in terms of investment and operating costs and it is observed that the industrial application is strongly dependent on the environmental restrictions and the concentration of sulfur dioxide at the inlet of the membrane device.

► A ceramic hollow fibre membrane contactor has been used for SO2 recovery aiming at its real application in the industry.
► The economic feasibility of the studied membrane device depends on the environmental restrictions.
► For process efficiencies higher than 80%, the studied membrane device is not competitive in an industrial scale.