Powering carbon capture installation to reduce CO₂ emissions

“We were approached by Future Environmental Technologies (FET) to discuss a carbon capture application which at the beginning presented us with many unknowns” commented Tim Worley, CEO of Powerstax. “At our initial concept meetings we started to determine a specification for the power requirements of the system but output voltage was still not determined as it was dependent on the requirements of the chemistry utilised in the carbon capture cells.”

A pilot design for a rectifier was agreed and the carbon capture technology was proven in a laboratory environment. During trials the optimum voltage was selected for a full production system along with an output current profile based on the number of carbon capture cells that would be required to meet the end customer’s exhaust rate.

FET selected a target company for the project for whom carbon capture had become important to their ethos of reducing climate change. A specification based on the specific requirements of the end user was agreed and provided to Powerstax.

The carbon capture line was to be installed in two shipping containers placed on-site near to the factory’s power station stack. To minimise the amount of heat generated by the Powerstax installation a high efficiency rectifier system was essential. Switched Mode technology was selected as the most efficient and cost effective at the required voltage and power ratings and also offered the required control interface enabling the rectifiers were to be linked to the FEC control system.

The high power required by the application required six individual rectifier stacks to be installed in parallel in the upper container. Due to the carbon capture chemistry requiring a low DC operating voltage but very high current, the voltage drop between the rectifiers and the carbon capture cells required careful consideration in the design and an integrated bus-bar was provided by Powerstax to ensure minimum losses at the cells located in the lower container. The final rectifier system delivered 10VDC at 28,000A running from a 3-phase input with less than 3% output ripple over its operating range.

Worley continued: “The trial at the end user site in Wales proved very successful and we are confident that a permanent installation can follow as soon as legislation catches up with the climate change evidence”. This pilot installation clearly demonstrated that FET’s carbon capture technology, powered by Powerstax, can help towards the UK’s drive to reduce CO₂ emissions and slow climate change. The system also allows the customer to store recovered commercial grade CO₂ which can be sold/used onsite for other applications.

Powerstax designs and manufactures an extensive range of standard, value-added and custom AC and DC power solutions for a broad range of fixed and mobile applications including hot-swap front-end AC/DC bulk power, DC/DC converter bricks and modules and programmable, modular, rack mounted power supplies.

Drake range of transformer rectifiers from Powerstax offers output currents to 5,000A and output power up to 1000kVA and beyond. Power solutions are available for harsh (marine, offshore, desert) and hazardous (Zone 1 and Zone 2) environments and can be oil, air or water cooled and can be sealed up to IP65 if the environment dictates with purge and pressure systems and heat exchangers incorporated if required.