Assessing the influence of thermodynamic equation of state and simulation software on modelling the CO2 solubility in physical solvents

Abstract

The most useful physical solvents in the industry are Propylene Carbonate (Fluor Solvent^SM), Methanol (Rectisol), Dimethyl Ether of Polyethylene Glycol (DEPG - Selexol) and Sulfolane. To address the challenge of choosing the right software and property package, two commercial software packages, HYSYS 14.0 and ProMax 6.0, are used to model the CO₂ solubility experimental data in the above physical solvents at operating pressures and temperatures as this two software are the most applicable software in gas treating simulations. The property packages of Peng-Robinson (PR) and Soave-Redlich-Kwong (SRK) and their regressed versions for CO2 capture purposes by Fluor Corporation and Bryan Research and Engineering LLC are utilized. The results show that the HYSYS Fluor property package demonstrates the strongest agreement with experimental CO₂ solubility data in propylene carbonate. In the case of CO₂ solubility in methanol, despite HYSYS showing a warning and guiding user to choose Acid Gas property package, HYSYS PR offers a more accurate match below 273.15 K compared with HYSYS Acid Gas and HYSYS Fluor property package and ProMax Polar property packages. ProMax PR and SRK demonstrate a stronger performance in modelling CO₂ solubility in sulfolane at all temperatures compared to HYSYS. Both the HYSYS PR and SRK property packages show a high accuracy in modelling CO₂ solubility data in DEPG.