Monoethanolamine Degradation during Pilot-Scale Post-combustion Capture of CO2 from a Brown Coal-Fired Power Station

The use of aqueous amines, such as monoethanolamine (MEA, 2-aminoethanol), for post-combustion capture (PCC) of CO2 from fossil-fuel-fired power station flue gases leads to undesirable reactions with oxygen, SOx, and NOx. This study has used a gas chromatography with mass spectrometry detection (GC–MS) method to measure the changes in concentrations of organic compounds in samples of a 30% (w/w) aqueous MEA absorbent obtained from CSIRO’s PCC pilot plant operating at AGL’s Loy Yang brown coal-fired power station in Latrobe Valley, Victoria, Australia. This aqueous MEA absorbent was previously used for more than 700 h of PCC, and the collected samples represent a further 834 h of PCC operation. These data provide a new perspective on the close, interdependent relationships between corrosion and amine degradation reactions. Other important outcomes include confirmation that (a) organic degradation products identified during laboratory-scale trials were also produced during pilot-scale PCC and (b) N-(2-hydro...