Nicolas Antunes Morgado


Last Name

Antunes Morgado

First Name

Nicolas

ORCID

0000-0002-5334-0856

Organisational unit

03484 - Mazzotti, Marco (emeritus) / Mazzotti, Marco (emeritus)

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Publications 1 - 2 of 2
  • Direct air capture by direct steam heating - experiments and comparison with indirect heating
    Item type: Journal Article
    Antunes Morgado, Nicolas; Ferru, Nicole; Bardow, André; et al. (2026)
    Chemical Engineering Journal
    The energy consumption of the Direct Air Capture (DAC) process is heavily dominated by the thermal energy required during desorption. To accelerate regeneration and improve efficiency, this work proposes to leverage the latent heat of condensation of saturated steam released when contacted with a cold sorbent. To this end, amine-functionalized monoliths were regenerated via direct heating using condensing saturated steam in a custom-built setup and compared to indirect (conventional) heating using a heating jacket under DAC-relevant conditions. The results show that direct heating substantially accelerates desorption, releasing the equivalent CO2 in one-sixth of the time required by indirect heating, while operating under a milder vacuum and lower temperature. A key operational challenge of direct heating is the management of condensate accumulation in the column. A simple thermodynamic model shows that a small H2O sorbent capacity could be sufficient to prevent steam condensation and its associated complications, provided heat losses are appropriately managed. These findings confirm that direct steam heating has the potential to be a fundamentally faster and more efficient approach for sorbent regeneration, offering a pathway to significantly enhance DAC productivity and energy efficiency.
  • 3D modeling of isothermal adsorption in structured contactors
    Item type: Journal Article
    Antunes Morgado, Nicolas; Mazzotti , Marco (2026)
    Computers & Chemical Engineering
    Structured contactors, such as honeycomb monoliths and laminates, have gained increased interest as sorbent supports in adsorption separations due to their ability to enable process intensification without the trade-offs of traditional packed beds. While 1D models are commonly used in cycle design, they often lump key 3D features of the adsorption process. An accurate description of these features within the contactor, such as spatial variations in sorbent saturation, can be leveraged during the design stage to enhance contactor performance. This work presents a general 3D model for structured contactors under isothermal conditions, capable of capturing flow phenomena like variable cross-flow within unit cells that lead to unconventional sorbent loading dynamics. To illustrate this capability, a case study comparing flow-through (FTM) and wall-flow (WFM) monoliths as air contactors in a direct air CO2 capture (DAC) cycle was carried out, examining the impact of air flow rate and wall permeability. The analysis highlights differences in fluid dynamics, mass transfer mechanisms, and the evolution of the concentration and loading level of CO2 on the sorbent for the two configurations, highlighting the 3D effects not captured by 1D models. Finally, a performance comparison based on sorbent requirements and exergy per unit CO2 captured was carried out, showing under which conditions WFMs may become competitive with FTMs.
Publications 1 - 2 of 2