2.4. Steady state regime studies
These carbon dioxide capture studies were carried out using the experimental set-up shown in Figure 1 employing the same bubble column reactor and gas flow rate mass controllers as previously described in section 2.2. The lean solvent was fed to the top of the bubble column reactor, while the gas stream entered the absorber at the bottom. The lean solvent was maintained at the desired temperature (40 ˚C) by using a cryostat (Selecta Frigiterm). The CO2-enriched solvent present in the bottom of the absorber was withdrawn from the bubble column reactor using a peristaltic pump (Selecta Percom N-M). After being heated until the target temperature (90 ˚C), it was fed into the top of a stripping section, where a packed column was employed to increase the contact between vapor and liquid phases. Thus, while descending through the packed column, this CO2-enriched solvent was stripped by the steam generated in the reboiler. A magnetic stirrer hot plate (Selecta Agimatic-N was used to boil the solvent and generate the vapor stream in the stripper. After leaving the reboiler and being cooled down to 25˚C, the regenerated solvent re-entered the bubble column reactor thus completing the process of steady state regime absorption. Different gas and liquid flow rates were used for these experiments to evaluate their influence upon the overall carbon dioxide absorption performance.