Chinese Journal of Chemical Engineering 23 (2015) 4249

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Chinese Journal of Chemical Engineering

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/CJCHE

Separation Science and Engineering

Mass transfer performance of structured packings in a CO2

absorption tower
Wei Yang 1,2, Xiaodan Yu 3, Jianguo Mi 2, Wanfu Wang 3, Jian Chen 1,
1
2
3

State Key laboratory of Chemical Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
State Key Laboratory of OrganicInorganic Composites, Beijing University of Chemical Technology, Beijing 100029, China
CNPC Research Institute of Safety & Environment Technology, Beijing 102206, China

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history:
Received 9 April 2013
Received in revised form 8 August 2013
Accepted 12 December 2013
Available online 30 October 2014
Keywords:
Separation
Absorption
Mass transfer
Packed bed
Structured packing
Carbon dioxide

a b s t r a c t
This paper studies the mass transfer performance of structured packings in the absorption of CO2 from air with
aqueous NaOH solution. The Eight structured packings tested are sheet metal ones with corrugations of different
geometry parameters. Effective mass transfer area and overall gas phase mass transfer coefcient have been
measured in an absorption column of 200 mm diameter under the conditions of gas F-factor in 0.381.52 Pa0.5
and aqueous NaOH solution concentration of 0.100.15 kmolm3. The effects of gas/liquid phase ow rates
and packing geometry parameters are also investigated. The results show that the effective mass transfer area
changes not only with packing geometry parameters and liquid load, but also with gas F-factor. A new effective
mass transfer area correlation on the gas F-factor and the liquid load was proposed, which is found to t
experiment data very well.
2014 The Chemical Industry and Engineering Society of China, and Chemical Industry Press. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
At present, global extreme weather occurs frequently. Various natural disasters threat gravely the human survival and development. All
these are related to the climate change which is caused by greenhouse
gas emission, especially CO2 emission [1]. Reducing CO2 and ghting
against climate change have already become global consensus.
There are three main ways to reduce CO2. The rst is the control
from the source. It can reduce CO2 and even achieve zero emission
when developing clean energy and renewable energy [2]. The second
is the control during the process. Improving the energy efciency can
reduce energy consumption and thus CO2 [3], which has great potential
in practical engineering applications. The third is the control at the end.
Currently CO2 capture and storage (CCS) is the most directive and most
effective way at the end of process [46].
CCS is of wide concern, but high cost and high energy consumption
are the main bottlenecks of CCS [7,8]. Researchers have done much
work, and most work is focused on solvents and process simulation
[914]. Some research works about packings used for CO2 absorption
has been done. Aroonwilas et al. [15] researched about different

Supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (51134017) and

PetroChina (2011E-24-09).
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: cj-dce@tsinghua.edu.cn (J. Chen).

commercial packings. Alix et al. [16] proposed a new structured packing

which generated a low pressure drop and a very high interfacial area.
Mass transfer performance of packings was often evaluated by using
the systems including airH2OCO2 [17], airH2OO2 [18] and airH2O
NH3 [19], where only mass transfer process proceeds and no reaction
occurs. In 2000, the model for predicting structured packing mass transfer performance in CO2 chemical absorption was proposed [14]. Later,
the effects of operating parameters on CO2 absorption in columns with
structured packings were obtained by using CO2MEA system [15],
and the effective mass transfer area of random packings (Raschig
super-rings) was studied with CO2NaOH system [20].
In comparison with random packings, structured packings are
made of thin corrugated metal sheets arranged side by side with
an opposing channel orientation [14], which offer excellent mass
transfer performance with a lower pressure drop [21]. Their specic
area is up to 250750 m2m-3 with a void fraction of 90%. There are
many kinds of commercial structured packings such as Gempak,
Mellapak and Optifow.
The main objective of this study is to shed light on selection
or development of a new structured packing used for CO2 chemical
absorption with a high efciency. In this study, the effective mass
transfer area and overall gas phase mass transfer coefcient of
sheet metal structured packings with corrugations of different packing geometry parameters were measured. All of the data were analyzed with respect to designing high efcient packing suitable for
CO2 chemical absorption.

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cjche.2014.10.003
1004-9541/ 2014 The Chemical Industry and Engineering Society of China, and Chemical Industry Press. All rights reserved.

W. Yang et al. / Chinese Journal of Chemical Engineering 23 (2015) 4249

43

Henry's constant (HA) for CO2 in aqueous electrolyte solution could

be determined by [23]:

2. Mathematical Model
According to two-lm theory, the interface mass transfer rate is
NA K G P yA ye :

The material conservation equation for the absorbed amount can be

written as
Gdy K G Ae P yA ye dZ:

lg

X
1

I c hi
Hw HA

13

hi h h hgas

14

2
2

5 2

Because of low CO2 concentration in the air, and OH in the liquid

phase in large excess, there is no free CO2 in liquid, i.e.,

lgH w 9:12295:9044  10

ye 0:

The value of h+, h and hgas were cited from Danckwerts [23].
The gas phase mass transfer coefcient (kG) for structured packing
could be calculated by the relation [25]:

Substituting Eq. (3) into Eq. (2) followed by integration results in

K G Ae


G
yin
ln
:
PZ
yout

Though some authors (for example [22]) calculated KGAe by

K G Ae

G dyA
:
PyA dZ

dnA
kG P A H A C AI S EkL C AI C AL S K G P A HA C AL S
dt

15






D
G uG dh 0:8 G 0:33
:
kG 0:0338 G

dh
G cos45
G DG

5
Ae

with
1
1
H

A:
K G kG EkL

T :

16

According to Eqs. (4) and (6), the effective mass transfer area (Ae)
can be calculated by

For a tower with height of 1.77 m which was much longer than that
of this study, it is believed that Eq. (4) (an integral formula) is suitable
for calculating KGAe in this study.
The mass transfer rate from the gas lm equals to that into the liquid
lm and it can be expressed as

T 7:8857  10


K G Ae
G
yin

ln
:
PZK G
KG
yout

17

3. Experimental Facility and Methods

The experimental facility and process are shown in Fig. 1. The
column was about 1.2 m tall with an inside diameter of 200 mm, in
which the height of packed section is 0.8 m. Sheet corrugated structured
packing was packed in the column to promote contact between the gas
and liquid phases. Air entered at the bottom of the column and owed
upward, while NaOH solution was pumped to the top of the column
and owed downward. After absorption, NaOH solution returned to
the tank for cycling while the air exhausted from the top.

The enhancement factor (E) for a fast pseudo rst-order reaction is

given by the surface renewable theory [23]:
E

q
1 H2a

Ha

kDA OH 
:
kL

CO2 analyzer

Because the reaction between CO2 and NaOH is very fast, H2a 1.
Thus, the approximate equality holds:
p

kDA OH 
:
E Ha
kL

Vavle

Packed
column

CO2 analyzer

Liquid flowmeter
Gas flowmeter

10
Vavle

The reaction rate constant (k) was calculated from the relations [24]:
Tank

2382
2
0:221Ic 0:0161Ic :
lgk 11:895
T

11
3

Because the concentration of NaOH is small (0.100.15 kmolm )

and the viscosity of the solution is close to that of water, the effect of
solution viscosity on the diffusion coefcient for CO2 in the solution
(DA) can be ignored. So DA was calculated from the relation [23]:
712:5 2:591  105

:
lgDA 8:1764
T
T2

12

Fan

Pump
Temperature Measurement
Fig. 1. Flow diagram of experiment.

During steady operation, the concentrations of CO2 in the gas entering

and leaving the column were measured respectively using an infrared gas
analyzer with the precision of 2 mlm3, while the concentration of

44

W. Yang et al. / Chinese Journal of Chemical Engineering 23 (2015) 4249

NaOH solution was measured by double-tracer technique. From these

measurements, the values of Ae and KGAe can be obtained. With the operation conditions changed, the mass transfer performance of different
packings can be studied. Table 1 lists the conditions for the measurement.
(See Table 2.)

Table 1
Parameters for the measurement
Parameter

Numerical value

Pressure for both top and bottom of the tower

Temperature
Concentration for NaOH solution
Spraying density
p
Gas F-factor ( F s uG )
Specic area for sheet corrugated structured packings
Corrugated angle of packing sheet (Fig. 2)
Corrugated peak height h (Fig. 2)
Addendum angle (Fig. 2)

0.1 MPa
301305 K
0.100.15 kmolm3
12.744.6 m3m2h1
0.381.52 Pa0.5
148273 m2m3
30, 37.5, 45
9 mm
75, 90, 105

Table 2
Contributions of anion, cation and gas to Henry's constant for CO2
h+/m3kmol1

h/m3kmol1

t/C

hgas/m3kmol1

Na+

OH
CO2
3

0.2
15
25
40
50
60

0.007
0.01
0.019
0.026
0.029
0.016

0.091

0.066
0.066

In order to study the effect of corrugated angle () on the mass

transfer, packings with of 30, 37.5 and 45 were used in this study
at the condition of small liquid/gas ow ratios usually used in the process of CO2 absorption.
4. Results and Discussion
4.1. Measurement of Ae
Under the condition of normal pressure and temperature, the gas
ow rate was maintained and the liquid ow rate was altered. By measuring the CO2 concentration in the gas entering and leaving the column
and NaOH concentration of the solvent, the effective mass transfer area
could be measured and calculated. Then, with the liquid ow rate maintained, the gas ow rate was changed. So the effective mass transfer
area under different gas and liquid ow rates could be measured and
calculated.
Fig. 3 showed that Ae was affected positively by gas and liquid ow
rates. Wilson [26] also discovered the same results. Alix et al. [16] discovered that Ae of a new structured packing 4D-50% also increased
with the increase of gas and liquid ow rates, because an increase in
wetted packing surface facilitated the mass transfer. It is worth noting
that when the ow rate of gas and liquid increased to a certain value,
Ae would exceed the specic area of packing material. This is consistent
with the fact that Ae was larger than the specic area of packings at a
sufciently high liquid ow rate [20]. At the high ow rate, the instabilities in the liquid ow (like ripples or waves, detachment and fragmentation of the lm into copious liquid showers) led to this phenomenon.
The pattern of packing arrangement impacts the performance of
mass transfer. At the condition of the same gas and liquid ow rate, Ae
was obtained with two arrangement ways of successive packings as
illustrated in Fig. 2. From Fig. 4 Ae of packings with a 90 rotation was
over 30% bigger than that with a 0 rotation. The result was similar to
that in [15]. Aroonwilas et al. discovered that packings with a 90 rotation provided a great and comparable efciency. It was possible that a

90 rotation arrangement allowed the liquid to spread not only from

side to side but also from front to back in the column. So the wetted
area increased.
4.2. Correlations for Ae
Correlations for Ae by Onda et al. [27] and Henriques de Brito et al. [25]
listed in Table 3 were tested to calculate Ae in this experiment. For comparison the parameters in the two correlations were regressed according
to the results for the packing with = 45, = 90, h = 9 mm of this
study. The calculated value and experimental value under different gas
F-factors were shown in Figs. 57 respectively. It showed that although
the trends were the same, results calculated by Onda et al. and Henriques
de Brito et al. could not predict Ae correctly with different gas ow rates.
The average relative error of new correlated Onda et al. correlation (19)
was 18.0% while for the new correlated Henriques de Brito et al. correlation (21) was 18.2%.
Onda et al. [27] considered that Ae did not change with gas ow rate.
Henriques de Brito et al. [25] discovered that Ae remained unaffected by
Fs for packings with less specic area. So in their correlations, there was
not a gas ow rate. However, it was found in this study that Ae improved
with the increase of gas ow rate. In this paper, the correlation by
Henriques de Brito et al. [25] was modied so that the effect of gas
ow rate could be considered. The new correlation was in the following
form:
Ae
u
x1 L L
Ap
Ap L

!x

Gw
Ap G

!x

22

According to experimental results, the modication was conducted by

multiple linear regressions to identify new coefcients x1, x2 and x3. The
correlations for the packings with different geometry parameters were
shown in Table 4. The comparison of experimental Ae and calculated Ae
by Eqs. (19), (21) and (22) were shown in Figs. 57.
For the packing with = 45, = 90, h = 9 mm in Figs. 57, the
modied correlation Eq. (22) obtains the average relative error for Ae
as 1.3%, compared with 18.0% of Eq. (19) and 18.2% of Eq. (21). So the
modied correlations with the consideration of effects of gas ow
rates showed better agreement.
4.3. The effect of geometry parameters on Ae
There are three main geometry parameters of sheet corrugated
structured packings. They are corrugated angle (), corrugated peak
height (h) and addendum angle () respectively. This paper tried to
change one parameter while xing the other two parameters. Packings
with different geometry parameters were tested so that the effect of
and on Ae could be studied.
When of 75 was xed, an example for the results of variation
was shown in Fig. 8. At the Fs of 0.38 Pa0.5 when Lw was below
41.4 m3m-2h packing with of 45 exhibited the biggest Ae, while
Lw was above 41.4 m3m-2h packing with of 30 performed best. At
the Fs of 0.76 Pa0.5 or 1.14 Pa0.5, when Lw was below 15.9 m3m-2h
packing with of 37.5 exhibited the biggest Ae, while Lw was above
15.9 m3m-2h packing with of 30 performed best.
Two examples for the results of variation were shown in Figs. 9 and
10. At of 45, packing with of 75 performed best except when Fs =
0.76 Pa0.5 and Lw = 44.6 m3m-2h. However at of 37.5, when Fs =
0.76 Pa0.5 or 1.14 Pa0.5, packing with of 90 performed best. In brief
the effect of and was also affected by gas/liquid ow rates. Under
most gas/liquid ow rates in this study, = 30 and = 75 were
the best parameters. Aroonwilas et al. [15] also observed that corrugated
angles had important impact on mass transfer performance.
Packings with different geometry parameters exhibited different
effective mass transfer area. In this study, eight different packings were

W. Yang et al. / Chinese Journal of Chemical Engineering 23 (2015) 4249

45

Fig. 2. Geometry and arrangement of sheet corrugated structured packings. (a) 90 rotation; (b) 0 rotation.

300
240

=45e =90eh=9mm
250

220

Fs=0.48m h-1
=30e, =75e, h = 9mm

specific area
200

Ae

Ae

200

150
Fs=0.38Pa

0.5
Fs=0.76Pa
0.5
Fs=1.14Pa

100

50
10

0.5

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

180

160
o

0 rotation
o
90 rotation

140
10

15

25

30

35

40

Lw

Lw
Fig. 3. Ae for packings with = 45 and = 90 vs. liquid load for different gas F-factors
with a packing arrangement of 90 rotation.

20

Fig. 4. Ae of different packing arrangement patterns.

4.4. Discussions on KGAe

measured so that the packings with the biggest Ae could be veried. The results were shown in Figs. 11 to 13. It was apparent
that when the gas F-factor was small (Fs = 0.38 Pa0.5), the packing
with = 30 and = 75 had the biggest Ae. However, when the
gas F-factor increased to 0.76 Pa0.5 or 1.14 Pa0.5, the packing with
= 37.5 and = 90 exhibited the biggest Ae.

It is important to note that corrugated angle had an impact on the

sensitivity of KGAe to liquid load variation. From Fig. 14, it could be
seen that the packings with corrugated angle of 30 was more sensitive
to the change in liquid load than the packings with corrugated angle of
37.5 and 45. The result was the same as in [15] that packings with

46

W. Yang et al. / Chinese Journal of Chemical Engineering 23 (2015) 4249

300

Table 3
Effective mass transfer area correlations

=45e=90eh=9mm

Onda et al.

0.5
Fs=1.14Pa

250

!0:05

0:75

0:10
Ae
C
L
Ap L2
L2
1 exp41:45
2
Ap L
Ap
L
Ap L L
L g

!0:2 3
5

specific area
18

200

Ae

Recorrelated for the present packing with = 45, = 90, h = 9 mm:

2

Ae
C
1 exp42:85
Ap
L

0:75

L
Ap L

0:20

Ap L
2L g

!0:05

L
Ap L L

!0:18 3
5

150

19

Experiment
This study
Modified Onda
Modified Henriques de Brito

100

Henriques de Brito et al.

50


Ae
uL 0:3
0:465 L
Ap
Ap L

10

20

20

25

30

Lw

35

40

45

Fig. 7. Comparison of different correlations to experimental results at the gas F-factor of

1.14 Pa0.5 for packings with = 45 and = 90.

Recorrelated for the present packing with = 45, = 90, h = 9 mm:


Ae
uL 0:191
0:414 L
Ap
Ap L

15

21

Table 4
Modied effective mass transfer area correlations for different packings with a packing
arrangement of 90 rotation

specific area

=45e=90eh=9mm
200

Fs=0.38Pa0.5

Ae

150

100

No

/()

/()

h/mm

x1

x2

x3

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8

30
30
37.5
37.5
37.5
45
45
45

75
90
75
90
105
75
90
105

9
9
9
9
9
9
9
9

0.1172
0.1167
0.08556
0.05905
0.06180
0.06160
0.04543
0.05289

0.2139
0.1492
0.1213
0.1225
0.1648
0.1706
0.1913
0.2471

0.2430
0.2748
0.3548
0.4453
0.3896
0.3850
0.4221
0.3430

3.8%
3.2%
6.9%
8.1%
7.9%
5.0%
1.3%
6.5%

Experiment
This study
Modified Onda
Modified Henriques de Brito

250

50
15

20

25

30

Lw

35

40

45
200

Fig. 5. Comparison of different correlations to experimental results at the gas F-factor of

0.38 Pa0.5 for packings with = 45 and = 90.

Ae

10

Lw=12.7
Lw=15.9

150
250

Fs=0.38 Pa

=45e=90eh=9mm
Fs=0.76Pa0.5

Lw=28.7

0.5

Lw=41.4

=75e

specific area

200

30

35

/()

40

45

Ae

100

Lw=44.6

150
Experiment
This study
Modified Onda
Modified Henriques de Brito

100

50
10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

Lw
Fig. 6. Comparison of different correlations to experimental results at the gas F-factor of
0.76 Pa0.5 for packings with = 45 and = 90.

Fig. 8. Corrugated angle vs. Ae at gas F-factor of 0.38 Pa0.5 and = 75.

smaller corrugated angle were expected to a greater change in KGAe

with increasing liquid load. The possible reason was that the lower
corrugation angle had a tendency to allow liquid at a given ow rate
to spread in a greater extent over the packing surface.
With the gas ow rate xed, and liquid ow rate was altered, the CO2
concentration in the gas entering and leaving the column was obtained
and substituted into Eq. (4) so that KGAe could be calculated. It was

W. Yang et al. / Chinese Journal of Chemical Engineering 23 (2015) 4249

47

250

250

0.5

Fs=0.76 Pa

0.5

Fs=0.76 Pa
=45e

Ae

Ae

200

200
Lw=12.7

150

=45e =75e
=45e =105e
=30e =90e
=37.5e =90e

Lw=15.9
Lw=28.7
Lw=41.4

150
70

Lw=44.6

75

80

85

90

95

100

105

100
10

110

15

20

25

/()

=45e =90e
=30e =75e
=37.5e =75e
=37.5e =105e

30

Lw

35

40

45

Fig. 12. Comparison of Ae for different packings at the gas F-factor of 0.76 Pa0.5.

Fig. 9. Addendum angle vs. Ae at gas F-factor of 0.76 Pa0.5 and = 45.

300
300

0.5

Fs=1.14Pa

0.5
Fs=0.76 Pa

250

=37.5e

200

Ae

Ae

250

Lw=12.7

200

150

Lw=15.9
Lw=28.7
Lw=41.4
Lw=44.6

150
70

75

80

85

90

100
10

95

100

105

15

=45e =75e

=45e =90e

=45e =105e

=30e =75e

=30e =90e

=37.5e =75e

=37.5e =90e

=37.5e =105e

20

25

30

35

40

45

Lw

110

/(o)

Fig. 13. Comparison of Ae for different packings at the gas F-factor of 1.14 Pa0.5.
Fig. 10. Addendum angle vs. Ae at gas F-factor of 0.76 Pa0.5 and = 37.5.

0.0110
0.0105

200
Fs=0.38 Pa

0.5
Fs=0.76 Pa

0.0100

0.5

KGAe

0.0095

Ae

150

0.0090
0.0085
0.0080

50
10

=30e =75eh =9

0.0075

100

15

=45e =75e

=45e =90e

=45e =105e

=30e =75e

=30e =90e

=37.5e =75e

=37.5e =90e

=37.5e =105e

20

25

30

Lw

35

40

=37.5e =75eh =9

0.0070
0.0065
10

=45e =75eh =9

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

Lw
45
Fig. 14. Liquid load vs. KGAe for structured packings with different corrugated angles.

Fig. 11. Comparison of Ae for different packings at the gas F-factor of 0.38 Pa0.5.

apparent that KGAe increased with the increase of liquid and gas ow
rates. As the liquid and gas ow increased, more CO2 molecules were
allowed to travel to the reaction zone, which would result in the higher

mass transfer performance. Zeng et al. [28] observed that KGAe increased
with the increase of gas ow rate using CO2NH3H2O system.
Aroonwilas and Tontiwachwuthikul [22] also used CO2NaOH system

48

W. Yang et al. / Chinese Journal of Chemical Engineering 23 (2015) 4249

28

will be used to evaluate the performance of mass transfer with different

packings.

26
=45e =90eh=9 mm

24

KG/kG /%

22

Lw=15.9

20
18
16
14
12
10

0.4

0.6

0.8

1.0

1.2

1.4

1.6

Fs /Pa0.5
Fig. 15. Proportion which gas phase mass transfer resistance accounts for in total mass
transfer resistance vs. gas F-factor.

and discovered that KGAe increased with liquid ow rate increasing

while remained unaffected by a gas ow rate. The liquid ow range
and gas ow range of Aroonwilas and Tontiwachwuthikul [22] experiment were 4 to 14 m3m2h 1 and 0.31 to 0.66 Pa0.5, which were
smaller than that of this study. This indicated that liquid lm was
controlling the resistance but when gas ow rate increased to a certain
degree liquid lm was struck into liquid drops so that Ae increased thus
improving KGAe. So in this study KGAe increased upwards when Fs
increased from 0.38 to 1.14 Pa0.5.
The total mass transfer resistance and gas phase mass transfer resistance can be calculated by KG and kG respectively so that the ratio
(K G /k G ) which gas phase mass transfer resistance accounts for total
mass transfer resistance can be obtained in Fig. 15. It was evident that
KG/kG was less than 50% and decreased with the increase of gas ow
rate. So the process of NaOH solution absorbing CO2 could be dened
as liquid-lm control. This is consistent with the literature conclusion
that the major mass transfer resistance lay in the liquid lm [29]. The
same result was also obtained by the Zeng et al. [28]. When the gas
ow rate was very high, the gas phase mass transfer resistance became
very small. In this case, there were two methods to improve mass transfer rate. First increasing the concentration of NaOH solution could
improve the enhancement factor of reaction which caused the decrease
of liquid phase mass transfer resistance. Secondly, Ae could be improved
by increasing the liquid load.
5. Conclusions
The performance of sheet metal corrugated structured packings
with different geometric parameters was studied for CO2 absorption
by aqueous NaOH solution. The results show that effective mass transfer
area of packings increases along with the increase in gas and liquid ow
rates, and even surpass the specic area of packings. The process of
NaOH solution absorbing CO2 belongs to the process of liquid-lm
control, and as the gas ow rate increases, the fraction gas phase mass
transfer resistance in the total resistance decreases. Effective mass
transfer area of packings is also related to geometric parameters, and
usually when corrugated angle equals to 30 and addendum angle
equals to 75, the performance of mass transfer is excellent. A modied
correlation considering the effects of both liquid and gas ow rates have
been proposed with a good agreement.
As for CO2 scrubbing, amine aqueous solutions are frequently used
as absorbent. In the future aqueous amine solutions (MEA, MDEA, etc.)

Nomenclature
Ae
effective mass transfer area, m2m3
Ap
specic area of packings, m2m3
CAL
concentration of A at gasliquid interface, kmolm3
CAI
concentration of A in the liquid subject
DA
diffusion coefcient of A in the liquid, m2s1
dh
hydraulic diameter of packing, m
E
chemical enhancement factor
Fs
gas F-factor, Pa0.5
G
total mole gas ow rate, kmolm2s1
Gw
gas mass ow rate, kgm2s1
HA
Henry's law constant for CO2 in aqueous electrolyte solution,
kPam3kmol1
Ha
Hatta number
Hw
Henry's law constant for CO2water, kPam3kmol1
h
corrugated peak height of sheet corrugated structured
packings, mm
hgas
contributions of gas to Henry's law constant
hi
contributions of i to Henry's law constant
h+
contributions of positive ion to Henry's law constant
h
contributions of negative ion to Henry's law constant
Ic
ionic strength, kmolm3
KG
overall gas phase mass transfer
coefcient, kmolm 2s 1kPa 1
kG
gas phase mass transfer coefcient, kmolm2s1kPa1
L
liquid mass ow rate, kgm2s1
Lw
spraying density, m3m2h1
NA
interface mass transfer rate of A, kmolm2s1
P
total system pressure, kPa
S
gasliquid contact area, m2
T
temperature, K
uL
ow rate of liquid, ms1
yA
mole ratio of CO2 in the gas phase
ye
mole fraction of component in the gas phase in equilibrium
with liquid subject concentration
yin
mole fraction of component in the gas phase entering
the column
yout
mole fraction of component in the gas phase leaving
the column
Z
height of packing layer, m

corrugated angle for sheet corrugated structured packings, ()

addendum angle for sheet corrugated structured packings, ()

mean relative deviation for effective mass transfer area, %

L
density of liquid, kgm3
G
viscosity of gas, Pas
L
viscosity of liquid, Pas
C
critical surface tension for packing material, mNm1
L
surface tension of the liquid, mNm1

Subscripts
A
CO2
e
vapor liquid equilibrium
G
gas phase
i
composition of the uid
in
gas phase entering the column
L
liquid phase
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