Capture research
CO2 capture constitutes up to 80 per cent of the cost of carbon capture and storage (CCS). For CCS to be a viable technology enabling deep cuts in global CO2 emissions from fossil fuels without excessive increases in power costs, significant reductions in capture costs are necessary.
The capture program aims to research, develop and deploy technologies that can achieve cuts in capture cost (75-80%) and provide Australia with a research and education capability to support industries using these technologies.
The objective is to review a range of capture technologies and applications that might be used by the fossil fuels industry sectors, selecting those technologies most likely to allow significant reductions in emissions and developing them.
A framework of economic evaluation is used to measure and validate research directions and integrate both with energy production issues and storage infrastructure.
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Enhanced Solvent Based Systems - enabling evaluation of their cost-effectiveness in the removal of carbon dioxide from a range of applications. These evaluations include energy, impurity and equipment factors that affect the cost of capturing carbon dioxide.
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Innovative Membrane Systems - evaluating gas separation systems to examine their cost-effectiveness in the removal of CO2 from a range of applications. Also looking at the design and performance testing of a range of membranes to cover a range of physical and chemical conditions such as elevated temperatures, gas separation, gas-liquid separation and separation in hot, moist gas streams. Research exchanges are also taking place with Japan and the United States.
- Performance of polymeric membranes
- New polymer membranes for CO2 removal
- Carbon nanoporous membranes for gas separation
- Optimisation of membrane module design for CO2 removal
- Impact of impurities on polyamide membrane performance
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Pressure Swing Adsorption Systems - enabling evaluation of the cost effectiveness of pressure swing adsorption systems in the removal of carbon dioxide from a range of applications. These evaluations also include energy, impurity and equipment factors that affect the cost of capturing carbon dioxide. The Centre will also evaluate other variants using adsorbent techniques, drawing together the full range of adsorbent cycles and materials development to develop complete carbon dioxide capture processes.
- Adsorption process development for CO2 capture
- Materials for CO2 separation by pressure swing adsorption
- Inorganic/organic hybrid membranes for CO2 separation
- Electrically regenerable mesoporous carbons for CO2 separation
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Hydrates and Cryogenics - enabling evaluation of the cost-effectiveness of hydrate and cryogenic systems in the removal of carbon dioxide from a range of applications.
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Economic Modelling - through which the Centre is constructing a computerised economic model for carbon dioxide and mixed gas capture and storage, and developing methodology, research reports and advice on carbon dioxide capture, storage and transport economics, as well as the economics of enhanced oil and gas recovery based on the injection of carbon dioxide.
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Other capture research
