Scrubbing process, limestone, capital

The capital investment for the spray dryer MgO process is approximately 14K higher than that for the comparable limestone scrubbing process. This is not an unexpected result since the MgO process is a regenerable system while the limestone scrubbing process is a throwaway system. 

The spray dryer MgO process appears to have a slight advantage (about 10 ) over a comparable limestone scrubbing process in terms of both first-year and levelized annual revenue requirements. This new MgO process, however, has a higher capital investment than the limestone scrubbing process. 

The dry SO2 scrubbing processes have gained importance in recent years due to their simplicity, lower capital costs, less operational difficulties and less power requirements compared to conventional wet scrubbing systems. One of the most common dry processes is the use of limestone in the fluidized bed combustors. Use of deactivation model for SO2 removal in fluidized beds is mentioned in Section 2. 

The capital investment for the spray dryer MgO FGD process is 139.5M ( 279/kW) in mid-1982 dollars while that for a comparable limestone scrubbing/ESP process is 122.0M ( 244/kW) in mid-1982 dollars. The capital investment for the conventional MgO FGD process (including particulate control) is 149.7M ( 299/kW) in mid-1982 dollars. These costs are... 

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