TY - JOUR N2 - The paper presents results of the field tests on membrane biogas enrichment performed with the application of mobile membrane installation (MMI) with the feed stream up to 10 Nm3/h. The mobile installation equipped with four hollow fibre modules with polyimide type membranes was tested at four different biogas plants. Two of them were using agricultural substrates. The third one was constructed at a municipal wastewater plant and sludge was fermented in a digester and finally in the fourth case biogas was extracted from municipal waste landfill site. Differences in the concentration of bio-methane in feed in all cases were observed and trace compounds were detected as well. High selectivity polyimide membranes, in proper module arrangements, can provide a product of high methane content in all cases. The content of other trace compounds, such as hydrogen sulphide, water vapour and oxygen on the product did not exceed the values stated by standard for a biogas as a vehicle fuel. The traces of hydrogen sulphide and water vapour penetrated faster to the waste stream enriched in carbon dioxide, which could lead to further purification of the product – methane being hold in the retentate (H2O > H2S > CO2 > O2 > CH4 > N2). In the investigated cases, when concentration of N2 was low and concentration of CH4 higher than 50%, it was possible to upgrade methane to concentration above 90% in a two-stage cascade. To performsimulation ofCH4 andCO2 permeation through polyimide membrane,MATLABwas used. Simulation program has included permeation gaseous mixture with methane contents as observed at field tests in the range of 50 and 60% vol. The mass transport process was estimated for a concurrent hollow fibre membrane module for given pressure and temperature conditions and different values of stage cut. The obtained results show good agreement with the experimental data. The highest degree of methane recovery was obtained with gas concentrating in a cascade with recycling of the retentate. L1 - http://www.journals.pan.pl/Content/110028/PDF/10_CPE-40-2_07-25.pdf L2 - http://www.journals.pan.pl/Content/110028 PY - 2019 IS - No 2 EP - 260 DO - 10.24425/cpe.2019.126116 KW - polymer membranes KW - biogas KW - methane concentration upgrading KW - trace biogas components KW - membrane mobile testing unit KW - multistage membrane system simulation A1 - Chmielewski, Andrzej Grzegorz A1 - Urbaniak, Agata A1 - Palige, Jacek A1 - Roubinek, Otton A1 - Wawryniuk, Katarzyna A1 - Dobrowolski, Andrzej PB - Polish Academy of Sciences Committee of Chemical and Process Engineering VL - vol. 40 DA - 2019.07.05 T1 - Membrane installation for biogas enrichment – Field tests and system simulation SP - 235 UR - http://www.journals.pan.pl/dlibra/publication/edition/110028 T2 - Chemical and Process Engineering ER -