THE ADSORPTION AND DESORPTION BREAKTHROUGH BEHAVIOR OF CARBON-MONOXIDE AND CARBON-DIOXIDE ON ACTIVATED CARBON - EFFECT OF TOTAL PRESSURE AND PRESSURE-DEPENDENT MASS-TRANSFER COEFFICIENTS

The adsorption and desorption breakthrough behaviors of carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide on activated carbon at wide ranges of pressure were studied theoretically and experimentally for single component and multicomponent systems. The effects of total pressure, inlet composition, and flow rate on adsorption and desorption curves were also studied. The experimental adsorption and desorption curves could be predicted fairly well by the linear driving force (LDF) model, and the LDF mass transfer coefficients at various operating conditions were determined by matching the theoretical model and experimental breakthrough curves for the single component system. An LDF mass transfer relationship with pressure-dependent mass transfer coefficients calculated from the single component system provides a reasonably good representation of adsorption and desorption data for multicomponent systems, and the correction factor included in the binary Langmuir isotherm gave the better representation of the experimental data. In the multicomponent systems, the effluent concentration of the light component (carbon monoxide) generally overshoots its inlet concentration during the adsorption step, and the heavy component (carbon dioxide) desorption curves in the desorption steps generally exhibited a plateau region.