Carbon dioxide absorption in packed bed of lithium orthosilicate pebbles.

Lithium orthosilicate (Li4SiO4) has the highest carbon dioxide (CO2) absorption capacity among the other lithium-based ceramic materials and is also suitable for high-temperature application for CO2 absorption. In this work, lithium orthosilicate pebbles of 1.0 mm size with 20% excess lithium carbonate were synthesized and fabricated by using Solid State Reaction Process (SSRP) and experiments were carried out to study the effect of various process parameters on its adsorption capacity of CO2 from air-CO2 mixture at elevated temperatures. The various process parameters studied were: operating gas flow rate, bed wall temperature and CO2 concentration in air on which very limited works have been reported. Effects of operating temperature, flow rate and inlet concentration of CO2 on absorption capacity have been studied to develop break through curves. The cyclic tests have been carried out with 15% CO2 concentration in air at 400°C and 200 LPH flowrate using the same material and carried out 135 consecutive absorption-desorption experimental runs. It was found that the CO2-absorption capacity of Li4SiO4 pebbles at 400°C and 200 LPH flowrates is about 31% for 30% carbon dioxide concentration in air and 22% for 15% carbon dioxide concentration in air. Moreover, no reduction in CO2-absorption capacity of the material was observed even after 135 consecutive absorption-desorption cycles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]