Novel Electrochemical CO2 Removal Technology For Combustion of Fossil-Fuels

Electrochemical gas separation concepts are often neglected when discussing options to manage CO2 emissions. Electrochemical approaches are selective and do not require periodic regeneration. This paper will review prior work on electrochemical CO2 separation and compare the parasitic energy penalties of this approach to more conventional approaches of capturing CO2 from flue gas streams. A new concept to reduce the electrochemical parasitic energy penalties will be introduced and a preliminary analysis of the concept will be discussed. Relative to a conventional monoethanolamine (MEA) solvent approach, electrochemical CO2 capture does require less energy on a per-mole-of-CO2 basis. However, there are trade-offs since an electrochemical pumping approach requires electrical energy, instead of lower grade thermal energy. Although there are several issues with electrochemical CO2 capture, efforts to reduce parasitic losses of CO2 separation may need to consider such novel alternatives.