(524e) Incorporating Technology Improvements in Amine Scrubbing in Power Plants With Post-Combustion Capture

Risks associated with technology, market and regulatory uncertainties for First-Of-A-Kind fossil power generation with CCS can be mitigated through innovative engineering approaches that will allow solvent and process developments in amine scrubbing technologies be subsequently incorporated into the next generation of CCS plants.Power plants capable of improving their economic performance will benefit financially from being able to upgrade their solvent technology or process.

This work identifies the key requirements to upgrade solvents used in amine scrubbing technologies by examining both the scrubbing process and its integration with the power cycel. A sensitivity of solvent properties is undertaken to identify bottleneck and quantify lock-in related to the overall performance of the power plant. 

One of the most important requirements for upgradeability is for the base power plant to be able to operate with any level of steam extraction and also with any level of electricity output up to the maximum rating without capture. This requirement will also confer operational flexibility and so is likely to be implemented in practice on new plants or on any integrated CCS retrofit project.