Numerical Simulation and Performance Analysis of Temperature Swing Adsorption Process for CO2 Capture Based on Waste Plastic-Based Activated Carbon

The newly proposed activated carbon with excellent properties prepared by plastic waste as a precursor is an effective way to solve the problem of CO₂ emission and solid waste plastic recycling. However, most of the analysis on the performance of this waste plastic-based activated carbon for the adsorption of CO₂ in flue gas is only carried out at the level of material characterization, and the performance evaluation at the level of adsorption bed in the actual adsorption process is lacking. Therefore, in this study, a two-dimensional adsorption bed model is established using computational fluid dynamics method. And the effects of adsorption temperature, desorption temperature, inlet flow rate and porosity on the adsorption and separation performance of CO₂ using waste plastic-based activated carbon are discussed. The results show that the CO₂ purity and recovery of this waste plastic-based activated carbon adsorbent can reach 43.13 and 96.08%, and the productivity can reach 152.81 kg t^–1 h^–1 when the desorption temperature is 400 K. Comparing with the commercial adsorbent, the waste plastic-based activated carbon used in this study has certain adsorption advantages in terms of recovery and productivity. It can be further proved that waste plastic-based activated carbon can play a role as an efficient regeneration adsorbent at the CO₂ capture level, and can promote negative CO₂ emission at the same time. This study provides an important reference for the resource utilization of waste plastics and the development of CO₂ emission reduction technology.