The article “Membranes and molten carbonate fuel cells to capture CO2 and increase energy production in natural gas power plants” by Paolo Greppi, Barbara Bosio, and Elisabetta Arato has been been accepted for publication in Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Research .

It is currently available as ASAP (As Soon As Publishable) article here .

Abstract:

Molten Carbonate Fuel Cells (MCFCs) can be used for concentration of carbon dioxide in Natural Gas Combined Cycles (NGCCs) exhaust gas, at the same time increasing electrical energy: when used in combination with Gas Separation Membranes (GSMs) for final segregation of CO2, they constitute an interesting carbon capture solution. This paper analysis distributed parameter models for fuel cells and membranes in a global plant simulation, so as to propose an optimized NGCC-MCFC-GSM process configuration that takes into account both fuel cell operational constraints and the specific limitations of membrane technology. The integration obtained produces very good results, presenting in all scenarios better economic indicators than conventional amine absorption NGCC retrofit. Furthermore, a great margin for performance improvement exists if the fuel cell maximum hot-spot temperature limit is tackled.