Capturing carbon dioxide (CO2) from post-combustion gas
streams is an energy-intensive process that is required prior to either
converting or sequestering CO2. There are a few commercial offerings
of 1st and 2nd generation aqueous amine technologies, however the
cost of capturing CO2 with these technologies remains high. To
decrease costs of capture, researchers are designing efficient solvent
systems with the goal of being drop-in replacements for 1st and 2nd
generation infrastructure. One approach has seen the development of
water-lean solvents that aim to increase efficiency by reducing the
water content in solution. Water-lean solvents such as GE’s GAP/TEG
are promising technologies, with potential to halve the parasitic load
to a coal-fired power plant, only if the intrinsically high solution
viscosities and hydrolysis of the siloxane moieties could be mitigated.
We present here, an integrated multidisciplinary approach to overhaul
the GAP/TEG solvent system at the molecular level to mitigate
hydrolysis while also reducing viscosity. We present molecular-level
insights into chemical speciation of CO2-containing ions, showing that
co-solvents and diluents have a negligible effect on reducing viscosity
and are not needed. This finding allowed for the design of singlecomponent
siloxane-free diamine derivatives with site-specific
incorporation of selective chemical moieties for direct placement and
orientation of hydrogen bonding to reduce viscosity. Ultimately, we
present new single-component diamine formulations less susceptible
to hydrolysis that exhibit up to a 98% reduction in viscosity compared
to the initial GAP/TEG formulation.
Revised: July 18, 2020 |
Published: July 7, 2020
Citation
Cantu Cantu D., D. Malhotra, M. Nguyen, P.K. Koech, D. Zhang, V. Glezakou, and R.J. Rousseau, et al. 2020.Molecular-Level Overhaul of y-Aminopropyl Aminosilicone/Triethylene Glycol Post-Combustion CO2-Capture Solvents.ChemSusChem 13, no. 13:3429-3438.PNNL-SA-152126.doi:10.1002/cssc.202000724