CEMCAP

D12.1 Results from 30 kWth CaL CFB experiments

Abstract

The integration of the CaL process into the cement plant requires operating the carbonator reactor under new conditions (i.e., higher carbonator CO₂ load, more active sorbent, smaller particle sizes etc). This report analyzes the impact of some of these new CaL operating conditions on the performance on the carbonator reactor. For this purpose, a 30 kWth testing facility has been retrofitted and operated under conditions closer to those expected in a cement plant application. A wide range of sorbent activities has been tested, up to those corresponding to large make up flows of CaCO₃ that will be characteristic in CaL applications in cement plants. The high activity of the sorbent has allowed to achieve capture efficiencies close to those theoretically allowed by the equilibrium, despite the low inventory and gas solid contact times in the carbonator. The results obtained have been interpreted using a basic reactor carbonator model that has required little modifications respect to previous versions, developed for power plants. Therefore, the results presented in this work provide further confidence about the scalability of CaL for capturing CO₂ in cement plant