Carbon Dioxide Selective Supported Ionic Liquid Membranes: The Effect of Contaminants

The integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC) is widely viewed as a promising technology for the large scale production of energy in a carbon constrained world. These cycles, which include gasification, contaminant removal, water-gas shift, CO2 capture and compression, and combustion of the reduced-carbon fuel gas in a turbine, often have significant efficiency advantages over conventional combustion technologies. A CO2 selective membrane capable of maintaining performance at conditions approaching those of low temperature water-gas shift (260oC) could facilitate the production of carbon-neutral energy by simultaneously driving the shift reaction to completion and concentrating CO2 for sequestration. Supported ionic liquid membranes (SILMs) have been previously evaluated for this application and determined to be physically and chemically stable to temperatures in excess of 300oC. These membranes were based on ionic liquids which interacted physically with CO2 and diminished considerably in selectivity at higher temperatures. To alleviate this problem, the original ionic liquids were replaced with ionic liquids able to form chemical complexes with CO2. These complexing ionic liquid membranes have a local maximum in selectivity which is observed at increasing temperatures for more stable complexes. Efforts are currently underway to develop ionic liquids with selectivity maxima at temperatures greater than 75oC, the best result to date, but other practical concerns must also be addressed if the membrane is to be realistically expected to function under water-gas shift conditions. A CO2 selective membrane must function not only at high temperature, but also in the presence of all the reactants and contaminants likely to be present in coal-derived fuel gas, including water, CO, and H2S. A study has been undertaken which examines the effects of each of these gases on both complexing and physically interacting supported liquid membranes. In a joint project, researchers at the University of Notre Dame synthesized and characterized ionic liquids, and researchers at the National Energy Technology Laboratory incorporated candidate ionic liquids into supports and evaluated the resulting materials for membrane performance