Carbon Capture in Molten Salts (CCMS) a new method of capturing CO2 was developed on a sorption and desorption principle similar to that used in the calcium loop, but proceeding in the molten salt environment (alkali metal chlorides and fluorides): MeO (s, diss. in molten salts) + CO2 (g) ↔ MeCO3 (diss. in molten salt)
The idea of the CCMS reactor presented in the only patent assumes its operation in a two-chamber system, allowing to separate the stages of CO2 sorption and desorption. The paper presents the development of a reactor prototype consisting of three basic elements, i.e. a sorption, desorption an intermediate chamber. The transport/pumping of salt between the reactor elements will take place on the principle of a gas lift, i.e. the transport will be forced by the pressure of inert gas. It was necessary to determine what the gas pressure in the gas lift should be to effectively pump molten salts The reactor chambers will be located inside the heating modules however, some elements for transporting molten salts will protrude above the heating zones and they must be thermally insulated. And here another problem arose , whether the insulation of the pipelines for the transport of molten salts is sufficient to protect them from freezing during contact with colder elements, and if not, then how to prevent it. The scope of the research included performing numerical simulations in order to:
• determination of the gas pressure needed to pump the molten salt between the reactor chambers;
• determination of the temperature distribution as the molten salts flow through the conveying system to anticipate the possibility of loss of pumpability due to salt freezing.
The above-mentioned problems of the CCMS reactor prototype operation were solved by means of thermal-flow analysis, performed using computational fluid mechanics methods (Ansys Fluent and SolidWorks programs).
Primary Language | English |
---|---|
Subjects | Environmental and Sustainable Processes |
Journal Section | Articles |
Authors | |
Early Pub Date | December 18, 2023 |
Publication Date | November 30, 2023 |
Published in Issue | Year 2023 |