The University of Kentucky’s (UK) Center for Applied Energy Research (CAER) has teamed with Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) to further develop its heat-integrated, post-combustion carbon dioxide (CO₂) capture system for application on a coal-fired power plant. The goal of this project is to scale up and test, at 10 MWe, the CAER system that uses heat integration, two-stage stripping, and an advanced solvent to enhance the CO₂ absorber performance, thereby improving plant efficiency. The project will be modeled directly after CAER’s small pilot (0.7 MWe) CO₂ capture system located at the Louisville Gas and Electric Company (LG&E) and Kentucky Utilities Company (KU) E.W. Brown power plant. Two key aspects that differentiate the technology from other capture systems are (1) a two-stage stripping unit for solvent regeneration in which the second stage air-stripper is empowered by the heat rejection from the first stage conventional steam-heated stripper, thereby reducing the energy penalty, and (2) a heat-integrated cooling tower system that recovers waste energy from the carbon capture system. Phase I tasks include developing the preliminary engineering design, techno-economic analysis, and technology gap analysis; incorporating small pilot (0.7 MWe) data; selecting a host site; and defining the Phase II experimental design.

Projects for the large-scale (equivalent of 10 to +25 MWe) pilot testing of post-combustion CO₂ capture technology systems are being conducted in two phases, with a competitive downselect to continue from Phase I into Phase II. This project was selected for Phase I; a Phase II application must be submitted to be considered for the full project.

Predecessor Project: FE0007395