Ind. Eng. Chem. Res.

2010, 49, 2857–2863 2857

Comparative Mass Transfer Performance Studies of CO2 Absorption into

Aqueous Solutions of DEAB and MEA
Kreangkrai Maneeintr,† Raphael O. Idem,*,† Paitoon Tontiwachwuthikul,† and Andrew G. H. Wee‡
International Test Centre for Carbon Dioxide Capture (ITC), Faculty of Engineering, UniVersity of Regina, SK,
Canada, Department of Chemistry, UniVersity of Regina, Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada

The mass transfer performance of the absorption of CO2 in an aqueous solution of a new amino alcohol,
4-diethylamino-2-butanol (DEAB), which has been developed as an effective postcombustion CO2 capture
solvent, was investigated and compared with the performance of CO2 absorption in a conventional amine,
MEA. The absorption experiments were conducted in an absorption column containing structured packing,
whereas the absorption performance was evaluated in terms of the overall mass transfer coefficient, KGav. In
particular, the effects of parameters such as inert gas flow rate, liquid flow rate, and solution concentration
were compared for both DEAB and MEA. The results show that KGav increases as both the liquid flow rate
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and concentration of solution increase whereas inert gas flow rate has little or no effect on KGav. An empirical
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correlation for the mass transfer coefficient for the CO2-DEAB system has been developed as a function of
the process parameters. In terms of comparison, the results show that the mass transfer performance of MEA
was greater than that of DEAB. However, with the extremely high solubility and ease of regeneration of
DEAB based on our previous study, it may be extremely beneficial to formulate an absorption solvent involving
both MEA and DEAB in order to take advantage of the synergy effects of high solubility, ease of regeneration
as well as the high mass transfer performance of the mixture.

1. Introduction solubility and physical and transport properties of DEAB can

be found in the literature.1-4 It is well-known that the overall
An appropriate technology for CO2 removal from a fossil fuel- performance of any solvent depends not only on its absorption
fired power plant flue gas stream is chemical absorption. This capacity and energy efficiency, but also, on the mass transfer
is because of the low pressure and relatively low CO2 characteristics and the kinetics. The present work focuses on
concentration of the flue gas stream. Selecting an effective
solution for CO2 capture is very crucial because of its implication
on both capital and operating costs. The size of the vessels
impact the capital costs while the energy required for the process
impact the operating cost. Presently, the most commonly used
absorption solvents are alkanolamines such as monoethanola-
mine, MEA, and methyl diethanolamine, MDEA. MEA is highly
reactive with CO2 but has the limitation of low CO2 absorption
capacity (an equilibrium absorption of 0.5 mol CO2/mol of
MEA) and high heat of regeneration. Alternatively, MDEA has
a high CO2 absorption capacity and low heat of regeneration,
but is limited by slow kinetics. Recently,1 the International Test
Centre for Carbon Dioxide Capture (ITC), Saskatchewan, Figure 1. Molecular structures of new solvents and MEA.
Canada has developed new solvents based on amino alcohols
for CO2 capture to overcome the drawbacks of these conven-
tional amines. The synthesis involved a systematic modification
of the structure of amino alcohols by an appropriate placement
of the substituents, especially hydroxyl function, relative to the
position of the amino group, in order to promote CO2 capture
performance.1 The molecular structures of these new amines
and the conventional amine, MEA are presented in Figure 1.2
According to Maneeintr et al.,2,3 these new amino alcohols
have shown much higher CO2 absorption and cyclic capacities
compared to that of conventional amine, MEA. Figures 2 and
3 show the absorption performance of one of the new solvents
(DEAB) compared to MEA in terms of absorption capacity and
cyclic capacity/regeneration ability, respectively. Details of the

* To whom correspondence should be addressed. Tel.: 1-306-585-

4470. Fax: 1-306-585-4855. E-mail: Raphael.idem@uregina.ca.
†
International Test Centre for Carbon Dioxide Capture (ITC),
Faculty of Engineering, University of Regina. Figure 2. Solubility of CO2 in 2.0 M DEAB and MEA from 25 to
‡
Department of Chemistry, University of Regina. 80 °C.

10.1021/ie900540v  2010 American Chemical Society

Published on Web 02/11/2010
2858 Ind. Eng. Chem. Res., Vol. 49, No. 6, 2010
Figure 3. Cyclic capacities of CO2 in 2.0 M DEAB and MEA at 15 kPa
CO2.
mass transfer. Consequently, 4-diethylamino-2-butanol (DEAB)
was selected to comprehensively study its mass transfer
characteristics in a packed-bed absorption column.
In the last few decades, tray columns have been replaced in
large part by packed columns.5,6 This has been due to the
successful development of efficient packings that provide a high
absorption capacity per unit volume of packing. Inside the
absorption column, the packing provides a contact area, which
separates the liquid flow into droplets. This increases the amount
of liquid surface area that is exposed to the gas phase, thus
enhancing absorption rates. Good packings should offer char-
acteristics such as large surface area to volume ratio, low
pressure drop across the absorber, and good uniform distribution
between the gas and liquid phases through the column. On the
basis of these characteristics, Aroonwilas and Tontiwach-
wuthikul5 have shown that structured packings offer a superior
performance when compared to random packings.
Therefore, the objective of this work was to perform a
comparative study of the mass transfer performance for CO2
absorption in conventional amine, MEA, and the new solvent,
DEAB using DX structured packing. The mass transfer perfor-
mance of both solvents is presented in terms of the overall mass
transfer coefficient, KGav under various operating conditions.
This work is also an attempt to develop an empirical KGav
correlation that is suitable for DEAB.
2. Determination of the Overall Mass Transfer
Coefficient
Absorption occurs when solute A transfers from the bulk gas
phase into the bulk liquid phase because of the driving force
(yA,G - yA,i) for mass transfer. This can be expressed in terms
of gas-side mass transfer coefficient (kG) as follows:
NA ) kGP(yA,G - yA,i) (1)
where NA represents mass transfer flux of the absorbed
component A and P is total pressure of the system. The gas
mass transfer coefficients kG is difficult to measure; in practice,
the overall mass transfer coefficient for the gas phase (KG) is
often used instead,7 and can be represented in terms of Henry’s
law constant (H) as follows:
NA ) KG(PyA,G - HCA,L) (2)
The relationship between the overall mass transfer coefficient
and the individual gas and liquid phase mass transfer coefficients
(kG) and (kL) can be given as follows:8
1 1 H
) + (3)
KG kG kL
For chemical absorption, the overall mass transfer coefficient
can be expressed as a function of enhancement factor (I):
1 1 H
) + 0 (4)
KG kG IkL
where k0L denotes the liquid film mass transfer coefficient without
chemical reactions.
Since the mass-transfer driving force takes place over
extremely small distances, the determination of the concentration
of component A at the gas-liquid interface is difficult based
on eq 1. Under this situation, the mass flux is expressed in terms
of the overall mass-transfer coefficient and the mole fraction
of component A in the gas phase y*A in equilibrium with the
concentration of A in the bulk liquid. Furthermore, in the packed
column, it is more useful to represent rates of absorption in
terms of volumetric overall mass transfer coefficients represented
by the term KGav instead of the one based on the interfacial
area unit because the gas-liquid interfacial area cannot be
measured accurately.
Therefore, it is more useful to present the mass-transfer
coefficient based on the unit volume of the absorption column
rather than based on the interfacial area unit as follows:
NAav ) KGavP(yA,G - y*)
A (5)
in order to evaluate KGav, the term NAav can simply be
determined by performing absorption experiments in packed
columns where the concentration profile of the absorbed
component A in the gas phase can be measured along the
column height.
On the basis of Figure 4 and considering an element of the
absorption column with height dZ, the mass balance of
component A can be given as follows:
( )
yA
NAavdZ ) GId (6)
1 -yA
KGavP(yA,G - y*)dZ
A ) GIdYA,G (7)
where GI ) molar flow rate of total gas without component A
and YA,G ) mole ratio of component A in the bulk gas.
The overall mass transfer coefficient, KGav, can then be
defined as follows:
KGav ) ( GI
)( )
P(yA,G - y*)
A
dYA,G
dZ
(8)
This approach has been used successfully by Aroonwilas and
Tontiwachwuthikul5 and deMontigny6 for analyzing packed
columns.
All of the variables in eq 8 can be obtained in absorption
experiments. The inert gas flow rate (GI) is an operating
condition of the experiment, which is conducted at atmospheric
pressure (P). The CO2 concentration (yA,G) can be measured
along the length of the packed column. The y*A is the concentra-
tion of solute A in equilibrium with the bulk concentration CA,L.
The measured CO2 concentration can be converted into mole
ratio values (YA,G) and plotted against the height of the column
to obtain the solute mole ratio concentration gradient (dYA,G/
dZ), thus enabling the estimation of the overall mass transfer
coefficient at a particular yA,G.

Figure 4. Small element of dYA,G/dZ in the packed column.
Figure 5. Equilibrium curve for solubility of CO2 in 2 M DEAB at partial
pressures of CO2 from 9 to 100 kPa at 40 °C.
The described procedure is only applicable if the equilibrium
line over the range of partial pressures is assumed to be a straight
line. The equilibrium line for the solubility of CO2 in 2 mol/L
DEAB at partial pressures of CO2 from 9 to 100 kPa at 40 °C
is shown in Figure 5. The partial pressure for this mass transfer
study is about 15 kPa. The curve shows that within this small
range, which goes from the first point to the second point in
the figure, it can be assumed that the equilibrium line ap-
proximates a straight line. Therefore, the transfer unit theory
could be applied in this work.
3. Experimental Section
3.1. Chemicals. 4-Diethylamino-2-butanol (DEAB) was
synthesized in the CO2 laboratory at the University of Regina,
Regina, Canada. The synthesis process is described in detail
elsewhere.1 At this point, DEAB is synthesized in-house at a
small scale. Thus a realistic cost cannot be ascertained at this
time. MEA was obtained from Fisher Scientific with a purity
of 99+%. Nitrogen and CO2 were supplied by Praxair Inc. with
purities of 99.9%. All materials in this study were used as
received without further purification.
3.2. Equipment and Procedures. In this study, a 30.3-mm
ID glass column of absorber with DX structured packing was
used. DX is the commercial name from Sulzer Chemtech
Company, Switzerland. It is the name or model for structured
packing with 900 m2/m3 surface area per element as shown in
Figure 6. There are many names/model of other packing
depending on sizes and functions such as Sulzer gauze Packing
Ind. Eng. Chem. Res., Vol. 49, No. 6, 2010 2859
Figure 6. Photograph of the Sulzer DX structured packings (Reprinted with
permission from deMontigny, 2004).
Table 1. Packed Column Characteristics
description data
inside diameter (inch) 1
diameter of packing (m) 0.029
element length of packing (m) 0.055
surface area per element (m2/m3) 900
number of element 37
total paked height (m) 2.035
total column height (m) 2.245
number of sampling point 10
BX or CY. The characteristics of the DX structured packed
column are described in Table 1. Figure 7 shows the process
flow diagram for the apparatus. Concentrations of the CO2 in
the gas stream ranged from 13% to 15% of the total volume.
The gas flow rate was controlled by using an electronic Aalborg
GFM-17 gas flow meter calibrated with a digital flow meter,
Model Definer 220, with (0.75% accuracy (Bios International
Corp.). The CO2 concentration in the gas stream was measured
with a portable infrared (IR) CO2 gas analyzer from Nova
Analytical System Inc. (Hamilton, ON), model 302 HWP.
Thermocouples from Omega Engineering Inc. were located
along the length of the packed column. All of the thermocouples
were calibrated with a mercury thermometer by using a hot
water bath before installation. The water bath was used to control
the temperature of gas and liquid inlet as well as to maintain
the concentration of amine in the solution.
Amine solutions were prepared to the desired concentration
by mixing deionized water with MEA and DEAB separately.
Figure 7. Schematic diagram of absorption process.
2860 Ind. Eng. Chem. Res., Vol. 49, No. 6, 2010
Table 2. Experimental Operating Conditions
CO2-MEA CO2-DEAB
operating conditions system system
inert gas flow rate (kmol/m2h) 17.33-24.84 17.19-24.80
liquid flow rate (m3/m2h) 5.26-10.52 5.26-10.62
solvent concentration (mol/L) 1.0-3.0 1.0-3.0
CO2 feed partial pressure (%) 13.4-14.8 14.6-14.8
feed solution CO2 loading (mol/mol) 0.011-0.156 0.136-0.173
inlet gas temperature (°C) 25 25
inlet liquid temperature (°C) 25 25
Solution concentrations were verified by titration with a known
sample volume of 1.0 N hydrochloric (HCl) acid solution, using
methyl orange as an indicator. The CO2 loading of each solution
was determined by using the procedure outlined by the
Association of Official Analytical Chemists9 using a Chittick
apparatus. By adding excess 1.0 N HCl acid to the sample, it
was ensured that all of the CO2 had evolved into a gas buret
for volume measurement.
The liquid solvent flow rate was controlled by means of a
variable area flow meter with (2% accuracy (Cole-Parmer) that
was calibrated at the start of the experiment by measuring a
known volume of liquid over time in a graduated cylinder. A
stainless steel magnetic drive pump (Cole-Parmer) was used to
pump the solution to the liquid inlet of the column. Before
entering the storage tank, the loaded solutions left the column
and flowed into a liquid trap that was made from a large,
elongated plastic tube. Without this liquid trap, the gas flowing
into the system would bypass the contactor and exit at the liquid
outlet. The liquid trap forced the entering gas to flow up through
the column.
The column was operated under counter-current flow con-
figurations in order to provide the maximum driving force for
mass transfer. The simulated flue gas entered at the bottom of
the column and flowed upward, while the lean liquid solvent
was pumped into the top of the column and flowed downward.
The treated gas left the system at the top of the column and the
rich solution exited at the bottom. Liquid redistributors which
were located within the column helped to reduce the problem
of liquid channeling along the wall. Packing elements were
placed in such a way that each element was rotated 90° with
respect to the previous one. Gas sampling points were located
along the length of the column.
At the start of each experiment, the nitrogen and CO2 were
set to the desired partial pressure and introduced into the system.
An infrared (IR) analyzer was used to verify the desired con-
centration of CO2 in the gas stream. Once this was achieved,
the liquid solution was fed to the system. Depending on the
operating conditions, steady state was reached within 30-40
min. Table 2 shows the operating conditions for packed column
experiments. At the steady state, the concentration of CO2 in
the gas phase was measured along the length of the column
using the IR gas analyzer. Finally, liquid samples were taken
and analyzed for their CO2 loading. The packed column had a
liquid sample at the outlet of the column to calculate any mass
balance error.
4. Results and Discussion
Packed columns are practical for mass transfer studies because
of the ease of measuring the CO2 concentration profile along
the column. This leads to the determination of the overall mass
transfer coefficient by using eq 8. The experiments for mass
transfer in a packed column were divided into 2 parts: absorption
into MEA and into DEAB. A total of 19 experimental runs were
conducted over the range of operating conditions. The effects
Figure 8. Verification of the packed column.
of solution concentration, inert gas flow rate, and liquid flow
rate on KGav were examined. The experimental equipment used
for this study was verified by comparing the results for MEA
with results from a similar setup for MEA reported in the
literature, especifically the setup and results described by
deMontigny.6
Compared to previous works from our laboratory such as the
works of Usubharatana and Tontiwachwuthikul10 and deMon-
tigny,6 the equipment, solution, and purpose of this work are
completely different. This work focuses on mass transfer study
a new solvent (aqueous DEAB) as compared to that of com-
mercially used amine solvent, MEA. On the other hand,
Usubharatana and Tontiwachwuthikul10 used mixed (hybrid)
solvents composed of MEA and methanol, and focused on
kinetics. In the case of deMontigny,6 the mass transfer resis-
tances and mechanisms of absorption were different. The cited
work reported a comparison of the use of a packed-bed column
with a membrane system using aqueous MEA in both systems.
On the basis of all of the results, the nature of solvent,
mechanism of absorption and resistances involved, and the
packing have an effect on the correlation.
A mass balance calculation using eq 9 was performed at the
end of each experiment in order to confirm the validity of the
run. The calculation compared the amount of CO2 removed from
the gas phase, as measured by IR, with the amount of CO2 added
into the liquid phase, as measured by the solution CO2 loading
apparatus. Theoretically, these two values should be equal, but
because of the errors in equipment, such as the IR analyzer,
CO2 loading measurement apparatus, and the large, elongated
liquid trap, the mass balance error obtained in this study was
about 8-15% and the percent average absolute deviation (AAD)
for mass balance was 11.5% which is acceptable for mass
transfer studies.
mass balance error )
( )
absorbed CO2 - removed CO2
× 100% (9)
absorbed CO2
4.1. Verification of the Packed Column. Verification of the
apparatus was performed by comparing the results with that of
deMontigny,6 as shown in Figure 8. It is obvious that the new
data followed the same trend of the previous work. However,
there were some differences between these experiments. The
major difference was the type of material and size of the column.
The packing in the previous equipment fit snugly in the column
and there was no channeling. The new equipment used for the
present work was larger, and the distribution was not as good
 Ind. Eng. Chem. Res., Vol. 49, No. 6, 2010 2861
as the previous studies. Consequently, this work had more liquid
channeling when using the same packing size, thereby resulting
in a smaller wetted surface area. This caused a decrease in KGav
values, especially at the lower solution concentrations.
Theoretically, the size of the column should have no effect
on KGav, as shown in eq 8, as long as the packing fits the column
well. However, in this work, the column size was larger while
the packing size remained the same. Practically, gas or liquid
would prefer to flow along the wall of the column because of
the low pressure drop or resistance. This will affect the KGav
value. However, this situation can be improved by adding liquid
redistributors to collect the liquid back to the center of the
column as mentioned earlier or by using a higher solution
concentration which provides for a more effective capture of
CO2 thereby minimizing the slip of CO2 by the column wall.
Therefore, with higher concentration and liquid redistributors, Figure 9. Effect of solution concentration in the packed column.
the technical problem was improved as shown in Figure 8.
4.2. Effect of Solution Concentration in the Packed Column.
The effect of solution concentration on KGav in the packed
column is an interesting issue since it affects design. The results
of solution concentration are shown in Figure 9 for both MEA
and DEAB along the column. From the results, it is clear that
increasing the concentration of the solution increases the KGav.
This means that the amount of free-amine molecules has
increased per unit volume leading to an increase in the KGav
values. However, the solution concentration needs to be
optimized for plant operation. Even though using higher
concentrations will lead to a larger mass transfer coefficient, it
is to be noted that the solvent cost will be higher, equipment
corrosion rate will increase, and liquid viscosity will also
increase leading to a higher pump power and larger heat
exchanger surface area requirements. Figure 9 also shows that
the performance of MEA was superior to DEAB under the same
conditions because the molecular structure of DEAB as pre- Figure 10. Effect of inert gas flow rate in the packed column.
sented in Figure 1 is bulkier than that of MEA. Also, MEA is
a primary amine whereas DEAB is a tertiary amino alcohol.
Thus, DEAB provides a greater resistance for CO2 to be bonded
to the amino group as compared to MEA, and therefore, reacts
with CO2 more slowly that MEA. Consequently, mass transfer
performance is lower. Thus, even though MEA system provided
excellent overall mass transfer coefficient which is higher than
that of the DEAB system, the extremely high solubility (Figure
2) and ease of regeneration (Figure 3) of DEAB make it
extremely beneficial to formulate an absorption solvent involving
both MEA and DEAB. This is because MEA has a high mass
transfer rate and fast kinetics but low absorption and cyclic
capacities. Alternatively, DEAB has high absorption and cyclic
capacities and ease of regeneration at low temperature but low
mass transfer rate. This implies that with the combination of
MEA and DEAB, there is the opportunity to combine the high
kinetics and mass transfer rate provided by MEA with the high
Figure 11. Effect of liquid flow rate in the packed column.
solubility and cyclic capacity and ease of regeneration of DEAB.
The synergy comes about because the fast kinetics of MEA those in previous works by Aroonwilas and Tontiwachwuthikul,5
allows it to grab CO2 quickly but also transfers it quickly to deMontigny,6 and deMontigny et al.11 on the packed column.
DEAB which has a high capacity and solubility for CO2. DEAB One might expect that absorption performance might be
is then the component that carries the CO2 along so that during improved as the gas flow rate increased. However, according
the regeneration step, it is easy to desorb CO2 from DEAB. to Strigle,8 the factor that controls the absorption process is the
4.3. Effect of Inert Gas Flow Rate in the Packed liquid-side mass transfer and not the gas-side mass transfer.
Column. The effect of the inert gas flow rate on KGav in the 4.4. Effect of Liquid Flow Rate in the Packed Column.
packed column is presented in Figure 10. In the figure, one can The effect of the liquid flow rate on KGav values is shown in
see that, similar to the effect of solution concentration, the Figure 11 for MEA and DEAB. Again, it is evident that the
performance of MEA was higher than that of DEAB. However, KGav values for MEA are higher than the values for DEAB under
a change in the inert gas flow rate had no effect on the KGav corresponding operating conditions. Moreover, the results show
values for both MEA and DEAB. These results correspond to that the liquid flow rate has an influence on the value of KGav;
2862 Ind. Eng. Chem. Res., Vol. 49, No. 6, 2010
Figure 12. Relationship between (KGav/L0.5) and [(Req - R)C]/PCO2.
Figure 13. Parity chart presenting the KGav values from experiment against
prediction for DEAB system.
i.e., an increase in liquid load generally yields a greater KGav
value. The possible reasons for this behavior is that a higher
liquid load leads to the following: (1) a greater liquid side mass-
transfer coefficient (kL), which is directly proportional to the
overall KGav in the case of liquid-phase controlled mass transfer,
(2) a greater effective area, which is caused by more liquid
spreading on the packing surface, and (3) the amount of free-
amine molecules in the system becoming larger or the system
having more capacity to absorb CO2 from the gas phase, thus
enhancing the KGav values.
However, the increase in solution flow rate leads to higher
circulation and regeneration costs, and thus, may not improve
the overall system efficiency. Maximizing liquid flow rates may
not lead to optimum operating conditions. Therefore, an
optimum flow rate has to be determined.
5. Mass Transfer Correlation of DEAB
An accurate predictive correlation for mass transfer coefficient
is useful for the design of the absorption column, and to predict
the effects of changing different parameters in the absorption
process. Many researchers have proposed such a model to
predict mass transfer coefficient. Kohl and Reisenfeld12 proposed
the correlation shown in eq 10 to predict KGav:
( )
L 2/3
KGav ) F [1 + 5.7(Req - R)Ce0.0067T-3.4PCO2]
µL
(10)
where F is packing correction factor; L is liquid mass flow rate;
µL is liquid viscosity; PCO2 represents partial pressure of CO2
over solution; Req is CO2 loading of solution in equilibrium with
PCO2; R is CO2 loading of solution; C is amine concentration of
the solution; and T represents temperature.
This correlation is suitable for the conventional MEA system
using random packing in the absorption column. However,
Aroonwilas and Tontiwachwuthikul5 and deMontigny et al.11
have suggested that this correlation is not suited to other
absorption systems such as the ones these researchers used
because different packing correction factors (F) will provide
different sets of KGav data. Consequently, deMontigny11 devel-
oped a different correlation for the MEA system. We have
observed from a parity chart and the average absolute deviation
that this correlation for the MEA system is not suitable as a
predictive correlation for KGav as a function of various system
parameters for the DEAB system. It thus became necessary to
develop a new correlation for the DEAB system.
5.1. Development of a New Correlation of DEAB. In this
development, the overall mass transfer coefficient was defined
in terms of the individual mass transfer coefficient as shown in
eq 4. The right-hand side term of the equation represents the
gas and liquid film resistance, respectively. When the liquid
film resistance is much larger than the gas film resistance (the
system is controlled by the resistance in the liquid phase), and
the equation can be written as follows:
KGav R Ik0Lav (11)
According to Perry and Green,13 the term kL0seems to be
independent of the gas flow rate, but it is a function of liquid
flow rate L to the power of 0.5. Moreover, Bravo et al.,14
suggested that the effective interfacial area (av) for gauze-type
structured packing is equal to the total surface area (ap) of the
packing per packing unit volume. Furthermore, Astarita et al.,15
suggested that the enhancement factor (I) can be expressed as
follows:
[(Req - R)C]
IR (12)
PCO2
where [(Req - R)C] represents free amine concentration. By
rearranging eq 12, the following relationship can be derived:
[(Req - R)C]
KGav R L0.5 (13)
PCO2
This relationship can be solved by plotting the term (KGav/
L0.5) against [(Req - R)C]/PCO2 as shown in Figure 12. The
proportionality constant is obtained as the slope of the curve.
Therefore, for the DEAB system, the correlation can be
presented as shown in eq 14.
KGav ) 0.194L0.5 [ (Req - R)C
PCO2 ]+ 0.155 (14)
The parity plot of KGav from experimental results vs one from
this correlation is shown in Figure 13. The predicted values are
in relatively good agreement with the actual value and the %
AAD of this correlation is 18%.
The presence of channeling could affect the absolute values
of the mass transfer coefficient obtained. However, the com-
parison of the trends and the effects of various parameters on
the mass transfer coefficient between MEA and DEAB would
be affected less by channeling. Since the actual values of the

mass transfer coefficients obtained in this work are peculiar to
the column used, the correlations derived may only be reliable
for the column used for the present comparative study but may
need to be verified for columns with no channeling issues. In
addition, it may be that there are other restrictions/limitations
of this correlation which relate mainly to the type of packing,
type of solvent, and solvent concentration used. The correlation
can vary significantly if these parameters are changed consider-
ably outside the ranges used for this study.
6. Conclusions
Comparative mass transfer studies of CO2 absorption in
aqueous MEA and DEAB solutions have been conducted using
structured packing in an absorption column. The performance
was presented in terms of the overall mass transfer coefficient,
KGav. Also, the effects of various parameters such as solution
concentration, inert gas flow rate, and liquid flow rate on KGav
for both systems were studied. The results have shown that the
solution concentration and liquid flow rate have effects on KGav,
in that KGav increases as solution concentration increases and
KGav is improved by increasing the liquid flow rate. However,
there is no change in the KGav value resulting from a change in
the inert gas flow rate. A new mass transfer correlation that
included the effect of the main operating variables was
developed for predicting the KGav value in the DEAB-CO2
absorption system. The MEA system provided excellent overall
mass transfer coefficient which is higher than that of the DEAB
system. However, with the extremely high solubility and ease
of regeneration of DEAB, it may be extremely beneficial to
formulate an absorption solvent involving both MEA and
DEAB.
Nomenclature
av Specific area of contactor (m2/m3)
CA,i Concentration of solute at the interface (kgmol/m3)
CA,L Concentration of solute A in the bulk liquid (kgmol/
m3)
F Packing correction factor
GI Inert gas flow rate (kgmol/m2-hr)
H Henry’s Law constant (m3-kPa/kgmol)
I Enhancement factor (dimensionless)
kG Gas-phase mass transfer coefficient (kgmol/m2-s-kPa)
KG The overall gas-phase mass transfer coefficient
(kgmol/m2-s-kPa)
K G av Gas-phase volumetric overall mass transfer coef-
ficient (kgmol/m2-s-kPa)
kL0 Physical liquid-phase mass transfer coefficient
(m/s)
kL Chemical liquid-phase mass transfer coefficient
(m/s)
NA Mass transfer flux of solute A (kgmol/m2-s)
P Total system pressure (kPa)
y*A Mole fraction of solute A in equilibrium with CA,L
(mol/mol)
Ind. Eng. Chem. Res., Vol. 49, No. 6, 2010 2863
yA,G Mole fraction of solute A in the bulk gas-phase (mol/
mol)
yA,i Mole fraction of solute A at the interface (mol/mol)
YA Mole ratio (mol/mol)
Greek Symbols
R Solution CO2 loading (mol CO2/mol amine)
Req CO2 loading of solution in equilibrium with PCO2
Acknowledgment
The financial support provided by The International Test Centre
for CO2 Capture, University of Regina, the Natural Sciences and
Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) and Natural
Resources Canada (NRCan) is gratefully acknowledged.
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ReceiVed for reView April 2, 2009
ReVised manuscript receiVed November 24, 2009
Accepted January 21, 2010
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