Solid Adsorbent Carbon Capture

Svante is a Canadian company that has developed an ADsorption-based technology to remove CO2 from flue gases. Key to this technology are MOFs (Metal Organic Frameworks). MOFs have a huge specific surface area and low regeneration energy characteristics. The real challenge was to find a versatile MOF that can adsorb / desorb CO2 reliably while remaining stable in the presence of flue gas contaminants and water.

Svante’s MOFs are “printed” onto sheets and stacked to form a Structured Adsorbent Bed. These SABs have a very low pressure drop across the beds. The recyclable filter units are placed around the periphery of a toroidal-shaped contactor, or RAM – Rotating Adsorption Machine. A sophisticated, energy-efficient, adsorption / regeneration cycle takes place over the course of a minute as the RAM rotates at a speed of approximately 1 rpm.

This combination of a proprietary adsorbent with a rapid-cycle thermal swing adsorption (RC-TSA) process is patented as VeloxoTherm technology.

This presentation will also discuss Svante’s operational experience in a demonstration plant at Chevron’s Kern River oil field, California, started up in January 2023. The plant removes approximately 25 tonnes CO2 per day. The feed gas to the contactor is natural gas flue gas varying in CO2 concentration between 4–20%. The demonstration plant operation has initially faced several technical challenges which will be discussed.

The demonstration plant was started in August 2023 and the test campaign as agreed with the DOE completed during February 2024. The plant was then upgraded, and this will enable Chevron to conduct a thorough techno-economic analysis (TEA) on the VeloxoTherm technology.