The effect of monoethanolamine on conductivity and efficiency of electrodialysis of acid and salt solutions

Abstract

Experimental studies of the specific conductivity (SC) are carried out for aqueous solutions of organic and inorganic acids and salts including those containing different amounts of monoethanolamine (MEA), which model the absorption solutions used in purification of gas mixtures from carbon dioxide and containing heatstable salts (HSS). It is shown that the addition of MEA to binary aqueous electrolyte solutions gives rise to changes in the SC: in the MEA concentration range from 0 to ∼1.5 M, the SC of the resulting ternary solutions increases but decreases again with the further increase in MEA concentration. This behavior of SC is typical also of aqueous binary amine solutions. It is shown that in the presence of MEA, the quantitative removal of dissolved acids and salts proceeds faster with the simultaneous increase in the specific energy consumption by a factor of 7–9 (up to 85.7–93.6 kJ/dm³). It is assumed that the reason for the decrease in SC and the enhancement of energy consumption at electrodialysis of mixed solutions is the probable existence of monoethanolamine both as free solvated ions and neutral molecules and as self-assembled associated structures (ion pairs and more complex particles) which involve also the ions of salts dissolved in amine-containing solutions.