MASTER THESIS PROJECT AT CHALMERS IN SWEDEN:

NOX FORMATION IN CHEMICAL LOOPING

COMBUSTION
Considerable efforts are made in research to realize carbon capture and storage (CCS), as the only way of
avoiding emission of CO2 from carbon combustion. Chemical-looping combustion (CLC) is a promising
combustion technology where pure CO2 can be obtained without any costly gas separation process. In
chemical-looping combustion the fuel is oxidized with oxygen provided via a solid oxygen carrier in an
atmosphere that consists almost entirely of CO2 and H2O. The fuel is thus oxidized without any direct contact
with the air-borne nitrogen. Although there is no gas-phase N2 present during the combustion, solid fuels, such
as coal and biomass, contains considerable amounts of organically bound nitrogen. If the combustion process is
not properly designed this nitrogen may form harmful species, like NO, N 2O, HCN, and NH3. As chemical-
looping combustion differs substantially from conventional combustion it is of outmost importance to examine
and understand how the CLC environment will affect the fate of fuel-bound nitrogen. Although there has been
a tremendous increase in the research around CLC in the last five years, with pilot combustors of approximately
10 MWth in size being planned, there are only a few studies with basic measurement of nitrogen oxides, and no
dedicated investigations of nitrogen chemistry in CLC.

AIM

The proposed project aims at experimentally characterizing the oxidation of fuel-bound nitrogen in chemical-
looping combustion. The selectivity of the oxygen carriers between N2 and NOx forming reactions is the major
focus as it will determine the formation of harmful nitrogen species. These reactions are highly dependent on
combustion conditions. Examples of parameters of interest are temperature, reducing potential (pCO/pCO2),
type of volatile release (NH3 or HCN) and type of oxygen carrier. The ability of the reduced metal oxides to
reduce NOx may also be of importance. The main tool of the proposed project is experiments in fixed bed
reactors. These experiments are suitable for studying the effects of the heterogeneous catalysis of the oxygen
carriers on oxidation and reduction of nitrogen oxides and volatile nitrogen species.

Division of Energy technology

Department of Energy and Environment
Chalmers University of Technology
SE 412 96 Gothenburg, Sweden
Chalmers tekniska hgskola AB
Reg.No: 556479-5598 VAT No: SE556479559801
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PRELIMINARY STRUCTURE OF WORK

Below is a tentative structure of the work, which of course may change after initial discussions. Also, results of
the initial work may change focus of the work. The aim is to make a new contribution and to limit the work to
be within the scope of a MSc Thesis while maintaining a high quality.

Establishing a first time plan of the work

Initial review of literature to determine operating conditions of interest
Experiments in fix-bed reactors
Processing of experimental results
Reporting

ORGANISATION

The proposed project will be a collaboration between the Division of Energy and Materials and the Division of
Energy technology at Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden. The research group has a long history in
working with chemical-looping technologies. The following persons will be supporting the work at Chalmers:

Supervisors: Fredrik Normann, normann@chalmers.se

Dongmei Zhao, dongmei@chalmers.se

Examiner: Henrik Leion, henrik.leion@chalmers.se

For more information about the Divisions of Energy and Material and Energy Technology check out our
websites:

http://www.chalmers.se/sv/institutioner/chem/Forskning/energimaterial/Sidor/energimaterialstart.aspx

http://www.chalmers.se/en/departments/ee/organisation/energy_technology/Pages/default.aspx