Environment
Could carbon capture work in the glass manufacturing sector? Dr James Wheatley*, Dr Douglas Barnes** and Dr Helen Atkinson*** discuss a laboratory-based evaluation of the lifetime and degradation of C-Capture’s carbon capture system to assess the feasibility of implementation in the glassmaking sector. demonstrate how C-Capture’s technology may provide sectors which have traditionally been deemed challenging to decarbonise a credible solution.
Introduction C‑Capture designs chemical processes for the capture of carbon dioxide (CO2). It has patented a safe, low‑cost post‑combustion capture technology which uses up to 40% less energy than current commercially available technologies. Carbon capture offers a crucial decarbonisation route for industries such as glassmaking and cement manufacture, for which carbon emissions are inherent to their processes and cannot be addressed by other means such as energy efficiency improvements, or fuel switching. In order for these industries to decarbonise, they must have access to a carbon capture technology which is both effective and economical. The Committee
� Fig 1. Impurities observed under a nitrogen atmosphere.
on Climate Change recently stated ‘Business models that are not compatible with a Net Zero future are increasingly risky’. If carbon capture technologies cannot meet industry requirements, it is possible to imagine a future in which foundation industries such as glass manufacturing become incompatible with a low‑carbon UK economy, and are forced to scale back their operations or even move offshore. Carbon capture on glass manufacture is challenging, due to the high levels of impurities found in the flue gas, particularly SOx and NOx. The current state‑of‑the‑art for carbon capture are amine‑based solvents which were initially developed in the 1930s. Whilst undoubtedly an effective technology in many respects, amine‑based solvents have limitations including: Continued>>
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arbon capture technology for both industry and power generation is widely accepted as being essential in order for the UK government’s net zero target to be met. Current carbon capture solvent technologies based on amines are energy intensive, and are susceptible to such extreme levels of solvent degradation under the conditions associated with glass manufacture as to be prohibitively expensive. C-Capture has a solution: a more robust family of solvents, resistant to degradation, which require less energy to use and are more environmentally benign than existing technologies. Recent work at C-Capture has begun to demonstrate its proprietary solvent technology to be more robust to conditions including high levels of SOx, NOx and O2. Here it presents some initial data from these experiments, which
� Fig 2 .Impurities observed under ~2000ppm oxygen.
23 Glass International May 2021
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