Removal of H₂S pollutant from gasifier syngas by a multistage dual-flow sieve plate column wet scrubber

ABSTRACT

The objective of this study was to observe the performance of a lab-scale three-stage dual-flow sieve plate column scrubber for hydrogen sulfide (H₂S) gas removal from a gas stream, in which the H₂S concentration was similar to that of gasifier syngas. The tap water was used as scrubbing liquid. The gas and liquid were operated at flow rates in the range of 16.59 × 10⁻⁴–27.65 × 10⁻⁴ Nm³/s and 20.649 × 10⁻⁶–48.183 × 10⁻⁶ m³/s, respectively. The effects of gas and liquid flow rates on the percentage removal of H₂S were studied at 50–300 ppm inlet concentrations of H₂S. The increase in liquid flow rate, gas flow rate and inlet H₂S concentration increased the percentage removal of H₂S. The maximum of 78.88% removal of H₂S was observed at 27.65 × 10⁻⁴ Nm³/s gas flow rate and 48.183 × 10⁻⁶ m³/s liquid flow rate for 300 ppm inlet concentration of H₂S. A model has also been developed to predict the H₂S gas removal by using the results from the experiments and adding the parameters that affect the scrubber's performance. The deviations between experimental and predicted H₂S percentage removal values were observed as less than 16%.

KEYWORDS:

• Air pollution control
• H₂S
• multistage sieve plate
• performance
• synthesis gas
• wet scrubber

Funding

The authors thankfully acknowledge the sponsor, Department of Science and Technology (DST), Government of India (GOI) and Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kharagpur, India for giving financial and technical support (sanction No: DST/INT/SA/P-14/2011).