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Removal of Ooganic contaminents from activated carbon powder

March 27, 2008

We are a Bangalore based Indian company specialized in the manufacture of point of use coconut shell based activated carbon for global domestic drinking water industries.

We are looking for the most economical mass production based method for removal of organic chemical contaminents from the granulated carbon feed stock of -100 to +325 ASTM mesh.

We are highly interested to learn whether surface functioning method of Plasma Treat will do the job.

N.G. KRISHNAN
Bangalore, KARNATAKA, India

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Do a cost analysis - it is many times cheaper to replace the carbon than to try to reprocess it in a vacuum chamber. You can even use the carbon as a fuel!

Trevor Crichton
R&D practical scientist
Chesham, Bucks, UK
April 9, 2008

I am not talking of reprocessing used activated carbon. It is about removal contaminants from virgin activated carbon granules. One method is to repeatedly and thoroughly wash the stock. But the process is very expensive involving enormous clean water wash given the extremely porous nature of the Activated Carbon which has surface area of 900 to 1200 sq M per gram! One possible neat solution could be use of open air plasma spray decontamination. Incidentally activated carbon cannot be economically used as fuel!

N.G. KRISHNAN
- Bangalore, Karnataka, India
April 12, 2008

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N.G., If you want to wash out the activated carbon, perhaps you woudl be better off recycling the water and either distilling it,using ion exchange or even Reverse Osmosis. It all depends on your contmainants and how pure you want the rinse water to be. By the way, I am not acquainted with open air plasma spray except in metal spraying technology. How does it work and what does it cost?

Trevor Crichton
R&D practical scientist
Chesham, Bucks, UK
April 15, 2008

Open air plasma technology is extensively used in industry as a very effective means of modifying surface chemistry of material to make them to easier to handle with out causing thermal damage to underlying material. This technology is a dry, environmentally friendly and cost-efficient technique used to modify on a microscopic level the surface of polymers, ceramics and metals as well as textiles, without any manual operation or the use of chemical products.

N.G. KRISHNAN
- Bangalore, India
April 25, 2008