(685b) Scalable, Volumetric Electrified Heating with High Frequency Magnetic Induction

The chemical industry has been one of the major contributors of greenhouse gas emissions. Many of these industrial processes require heating of volumetric reaction media to high temperatures, with applications ranging from the pollutants capture to production of chemicals. One solution to mitigating these carbon emissions is to utilize renewable and clean electricity, instead of fossil fuels, to provide endothermic heat. Amongst the wide range of electrification heating concepts, inductive heating(IH) is an established method for efficient, and rapid heating. However, an underlying challenge is understanding how IH can be adapted to heat volumetric media uniformly and its integration with different reactor configurations. An extensive understanding of the design of heating susceptors, catalyst integration with susceptor, and co-design of power electronics are required.

We present a highly efficient inductively heated reactor system tailored for CO₂ capture from flue gas. The system design involves the placement of a metallic open cell lattice susceptor together with carbonate-based sorbent. CO₂ capture is mediated by operating the reactor in a fluidized bed mode, in which carbonate-bicarbonate chemistry is used to selectively capture CO₂. To regenerate the sorbent and release high purity CO₂, a temperature swing is applied by inductively heating the susceptor. Due to the large surface area-to-volume ratio of the susceptor, heat transfer between the susceptor and sorbent is achieved with minimized temperature gradients and fast heating rates. Energy transfer efficiency from the power electronics (I.e., board and magnetic coil) to the susceptor was tuned and optimized by employing a novel high frequency (~ MHz scale) power circuit and coil design. Desired volumetric heating profiles spanning the full reactor width were achieved by co-designing the power electronics and susceptor such that magnetic induction and Eddy current dissipation occurred throughout the reactor volume. In experimental demonstrations, we showcased electricity-to-heat conversion efficiencies of over 90%.