GE Awarded DOE Project to Pilot CO2 Capture Technology for Power Plants

Calling it CO2“Capture Technology in a Bottle,” a team of researchers at GE’s Oil & GasTechnology Center in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma have been awarded close to $1million in Phase I funding by the U.S. Department of Energy’s National EnergyTechnology Laboratories (NETL) to plan and propose a large scale pilot testingof its CO2 Capture technology solution.

“GE scientists have developed an innovative solution torealize both goals, which works well in the lab. Through this project, we willhave the opportunity to perform tests at a much larger scale to learn how tomake it work in a power plant.”

GE chemists have developed a solution that effectivelyuses a class of amino silicone compounds at various temperatures to capturecarbon. These compounds are the same as those found in hair conditioners andfabric softeners. In hair products and washing machines, these compounds areused to soften your hair or clothing. GE is using them attach to andessentially wash out CO2 gas from a power plant flue stack.

How it works

At temperatures ofaround 105 degrees F, the amino silicone materials attach to CO2 gas. When theheat is increased another 100 degrees F, these materials release the carbon andcan then be re-used to capture more. One of the big advantages of GE’s technologyis that it does not require any water, which substantially reduces the energyrequired to capture the carbon.

“For decades,scientists from around the world have focused their efforts on finding moreeffective, less expensive ways to reduce CO2 emissions in the atmosphere,” saidPhil DiPietro, Technical Manager, CO2 Capture and Separation, GE’s Oil and GasTechnology Center in Oklahoma City. “GE scientists have developed an innovativesolution to realize both goals, which works well in the lab. Through thisproject, we will have the opportunity to perform tests at a much larger scaleto learn how to make it work in a power plant.”

Testing of GE’s newCO2 capture solution will take place at the CO2 Technology Center at Mongstad(TCM), Norway, which is the world’s largest industrial scale test facility.This $1 billion (USD) facility is fully instrumented and designed to providetechnology developers with an infrastructure to subject their technologies toall the stresses that real-time operations would entail. GE is partnering withthe CO2 Capture Centre in Mongstad.

TCM Managing DirectorMr. Roy Vardheim said: “We are very satisfied that the close co-operationbetween the US and Norway now facilitates bringing leading technologies andcompanies to our world class testing arena at Mongstad. We are impressed withthe technological developments by our US partners, and are confident that theywill benefit from the unique qualities of the TEST facilities and services thatTCM will provide.

As part of Phase 1funding, GE will advance planning of their Amino-silicone CO2 capturetechnology towards large scale pilot testing. It is expected that two of thesix phase 1 projects will be selected for Phase 2. The Phase 2 awards forconstruction and execution of pilot testing is anticipated by mid-2016. Thelarge scale testing will aim to demonstrate the technology at industrial scaleand provide final confidence in the maturity of the Carbon Capture technologyfor full scale commercial deployment, reducing emissions from power plants andother large industrial point sources of CO2.

GE’s technologydevelopment taps into decades of expertise working with amino siliconematerials when GE operated a silicones business. The NETL project is part of adecade long joint cooperation between the US and Norwegian energy authoritieson CO2 Capture and Storage technologies. The co-operation between the US andNorwegian Energy authorities in the area of carbon capture and storage datesback to 2004, when the two governments signed a memorandum of understanding(MOU).