Advanced Adsorptive Carbon Capture from Waste Incineration Flue Gas
Process Integration, Optimization, and Techno-Economic-Environmental Analysis for Circular Carbon Economy
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MSCA_PF-KKarimi[04]
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Chemical Engineering
The department of Chemical Engineering of the VUB has the ambition to stay at the forefront of the research on liquid chromatography and adsorptive separations, and expand its activities into other areas of low-energy cost liquid-phase separation techniques, such as membrane separations and micro-scale extractions. The group largely owes its international reputation to the fact that it has positioned itself as a group developing innovative solutions that bridge the gap between the molecular scale and the micro- to millimeter scale of the packing or housing materials typically used in chemical processes. To capitalize on this successful strategy, the group wants to run a dedicated research program focusing on “Exploiting the Advantages of Order and Confinement for a Greener Chemistry”, as a backbone program to grow into one of Europe’s leading Centers of Expertise in separation science.
Beschrijving van het project
This research project aims to develop efficient, scalable, and cost-effective adsorption-based carbon capture systems for waste-to-energy (WtE) plants, addressing the urgent need to reduce CO₂ emissions while advancing circular carbon economy principles. The study focuses on flue gas from municipal solid waste (MSW) incineration, which contains 4–12% CO₂ along with challenging contaminants (SOₓ, NOₓ, particulates, heavy metals).
The research will focus on three critical pillars:
- Advanced adsorbent development, involving the design and testing of novel materials
- Process integration and optimization, developing hybrid capture systems that combine adsorption with existing flue gas treatments
- Comprehensive techno-economic and environmental analysis, assessing economic viability through CAPEX/OPEX evaluation and break-even CO₂ price comparisons with conventional technologies, quantifying environmental benefits via life cycle assessment (net CO₂ reduction, energy efficiency), and identifying circular economy opportunities such as CO₂ utilization for synthetic fuels or mineralization processes.
Supervision & Expertise
This project is supervised by Prof. Keikhosro Karimi (a world-leading expert in adsorption technologies, sustainable process engineering, and waste valorization, ranked among the top 2% most-cited scientists globally (Stanford University) with over 300 peer-reviewed publications).