Simulated moving bed chromatography for gaseous applications

SMB chromatography is a practical way of implementing a counter-current chromatographic process. The cyclic steady-state of continuous multicolumn GC, operating under isothermal conditions, can be reproduced experimentally using a single-column setup. The setup was employed to demonstrate the process feasibility, explore the effect of its major operating parameters, and illustrate the performance enhancements. By correctly selecting the step within the cycle for process start-up, the steady periodic state can be achieved in a minimum number of cycles. Hence, the adsorbates and eluent quantities required to experimentally reproduce the periodic state of the SMB process can be greatly reduced. The implementation was successfully applied to separate CO₂/CH₄ gas mixtures on activated carbon in the Henry's law region using N₂ as purge gas. This is an abstract of a paper presented at the 2007 AIChE Annual Meeting (Salt Lake City, UT 11/4-9/2007).