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US 2010/0136443 A1Published application
Volatile Organic Compound Abatement With Fuel Cell Power Plant
AssigneeUTC Power Corporation
InventorAntonio M. Vincitore
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Abstract
Absorbent material in a regenerable volatile organic compound (VOC) apparatus (15) is regenerated by a flow (92) of desorption gas heated (90) by exhaust (87) of a burner (58) of a reformer (57), which reforms hydrocarbon fuel (55) to generate hydrogen-rich reformate gas that is provided (46, 48, 61) to anodes of a fuel cell (64), steam (83) from fuel cell coolant (73, 79) being provided (62, 56) to said reformer. The fuel may be desulfurized (53) using the reformate gas (44, 45). The reformate may be enriched by a shift reactor (48).
Claims15
A method comprising:
- absorbing volatile organic compounds from a flow (13) of gas in a regenerable absorption bed (15);
- providing a flow (20) of desorption exhaust gas from said regenerable absorption bed to a fuel inlet (71) of a burner (58);
- characterized by:
- said providing step comprises providing said flow to a burner of a reformer (57) that generates hydrogen-rich reformate gas (61);
- heating (90) air (35) with exhaust (86) of said burner to provide desorption gas (92) to said bed;
- and
- reacting at least some of said reformate gas in a fuel cell power plant (64) to provide electric power.
4 more elements
A system comprising:
- a regenerable volatile organic compound absorption apparatus (15) adapted to receive a flow (13) of gas containing volatile organic compounds and adapted to regenerate absorbent material therein by means of a flow (92) of hot desorption gas provided to a desorption gas inlet (41) of said apparatus;
- a burner (58) with exhaust, said burner configured to burn desorption effluent from a desorption gas outlet (20) of said apparatus;
- characterized by:
- said burner is part of a reformer (57) configured to reform hydrocarbon fuel (55) to provide hydrogen-containing reformate gas (61);
- heat transfer apparatus (90) for transferring heat from the exhaust of said burner to said desorption gas, said heat transfer apparatus configured to deliver (90) heated desorption gas to said inlet;
- and
- a fuel cell power plant (64) having anodes to which at least some of said hydrogen-containing reformate gas is provided (48, 46, 63).
4 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.