Abstract
Acetaldehyde is one of the malodorous gaseous components emitted at high temperature crematory furnace. In this study a corona discharge reactor is employed to remove acetaldehyde (CH3CHO) from N2 and air from room temperature up to 300°C. First the effect of acetaldehyde inlet concentration (200, 400 and 600 ppm) is investigated. In contrast to conventional separation processes, the more dilute the inlet concentration, the higher the removal efficiency becomes because, when the discharged current is kept constant, the number ratio of discharge electrons to acetaldehyde molecules increases. Next the effect of oxygen and/or water vapor in the emission gas is investigated. Interestingly the presence of either oxygen or water vapor always enhances the removal acetaldehyde from N2. When the reaction temperature is increased, the removal efficiency is to increase starting from room temperature up to 200°C, above which the tendency reverses 300°C. It is found that the smallest discharge current required for complete removal of 600 ppm of acetaldehyde from the air is only 0.2 mA at room temperature. To elucidate the effect of temperature, the discharge current is deliberately set at 0.05 mA in some experiments.
