New scrubber technology reduces flue gas emissions

Skyonic Corporation has announced a new scrubber technology that can remove virtually all sulfur oxides (SOx) and nitrogen oxides (NOx) emitted from flue gas stacks. This new scrubber technology, SkyScraper™, is designed to help refining, power and other industrial plants safely treat flue gas streams and have the potential to mitigate rising environmental concerns around fly ash. SkyScraper™ captures between 97-99 percent of pollutants found in exhaust gases, including SOx, NO2, mercury (Hg) and other heavy metals, and mineralizes these and other toxins while producing marketable byproducts, including chlorine and hydrogen.

This month, new regulations imposed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will take effect, designed to decrease the GHGs deemed most detrimental to the environment and human health under the Clean Air Act of 1970. The largest fossil-fuel power plants (utility and refinery sectors) will be affected by the new rules first, in addition to any new construction facilities that will emit more than 100,000 tons of CO2 or GHGs annually. Existing plants that also modify facilities resulting in a 75,000-ton increase in annual emissions will have to meet these guidelines. SkyScraper™ addresses the GHG rules within these new mandates, while also providing a means for coal power plants to comply with other impending EPA rules that place challenging restrictions on the emissions of SOx and NOx, Hg and other pollutants from coal-fired plants.

SkyScraper™ can operate down to the 10MW equivalent level and costs less per KW than current wet-limestone and SCR scrubbing, which is only scalable to large (400 MW or greater) equivalents and costs $400 – 650/KW capital.. Additionally, current scrubbing technologies release CO2 as they capture acid gases; in contrast, SkyScraper™ does not release any CO2, which is consistent with Skyonic's overall mission. SkyScraper™-enabled plants safely capture and remove practically all of the pollutants that cycle through flue gas streams, and we're confident it can effect real change in the industry while helping to meet current and future regulatory requirements for reducing these emissions," added Jones.

The patent-pending SkyScraper™ technology is a post-combustion process, and can be easily retrofitted to existing infrastructures or implemented as a new facility is being planned and built.