Carbon dioxide absorption and anti-clogging performance of a novel millimeter-scale channel absorber

This study proposes a novel millimeter-scale channel absorber for the first time, which involves carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) absorption in the channel to achieve efficient CO 2 absorption while avoiding clogging. CO 2 absorption experiments were conducted on such a channel absorber with an inner diameter of 2.3 mm to study its CO 2 mass transfer and absorption characteristics. Al 2 O 3 particles were introduced as solid impurities to evaluate its anti-clogging performance. The experimental results showed that a stable Taylor flow could be formed in the channel in appropriate gas and liquid flowrate ranges. The liquid-side volume mass transfer coefficient ( K L a ) reached 0.34 s −1 using a 6% DEA solution as the absorbent, which was approximately one order of magnitude higher than that of the conventional packed towers. When Al 2 O 3 to a maximum extent of 2 wt% was added into the absorbents, no clogging was observed, and the values of K L a even increased. Due to the excellent CO 2 absorption mass transfer and anti-clogging performance, millimeter channel absorbers have promising industrial applications for CO 2 absorption. Therefore, means and application scenario for applying millimeter-scale channel absorber in the industrial CO 2 absorption have been proposed.