Transient plasma-enhanced remediation of nanoscale particulate matter in restaurant smoke emissions via electrostatic precipitation--颗粒学报PARTICUOLOGY

Yang, S., Ford, P., Subramanian, S., Singleton, D., Sanders, J., & Cronin, S. B. (2021). Transient plasma-enhanced remediation of nanoscale particulate matter in restaurant smoke emissions via electrostatic precipitation. Particuology, 55, 43-47. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.partic.2020.06.003

Transient plasma-enhanced remediation of nanoscale particulate matter in restaurant smoke emissions via electrostatic precipitation

Sisi Yang ^a, Patrick Ford ^d, Sriram Subramanian ^c, Dan Singleton ^d, Jason Sanders ^d, Stephen B. Cronin ^{a b d *}

a Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA 90089, USA
b Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA 90089, USA
c Daniel J. Epstein Department of Industrial & System Engineering, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA 90089, USA
d Transient Plasma Systems, Inc., Torrance, CA 90501, USA

10.1016/j.partic.2020.06.003

Volume 55, April 2021, Pages 43-47

Received 18 March 2020, Revised 25 May 2020, Accepted 20 June 2020, Available online 15 July 2020, Version of Record 3 February 2021.

E-mail: scronin@usc.edu

Highlights

• Nanosecond pulsed plasma with a DC bias gives effective remediation of oil aerosols.

• 99.9% particulate remediation was achieved for polyaromatic olefin PAO-4.

• Over 1260-fold reduction in particulate concentration was achieved for soybean oil.

Abstract

It is now recognized that nanoscale particulate matter (PM) represents a substantial health hazard for our society, including PM from restaurant smoke. In this study, we explored the use of a transient pulsed plasma in conjunction with an applied DC bias to treat oil aerosols that closely resemble restaurant (i.e., charbroiler) smoke emissions. For polyaromatic olefin PAO-4 and soybean oil, we found that a three-order-of-magnitude reduction in particulates (i.e., 99.9% remediation) could be achieved with this system. Here, the plasma discharge was produced in a 4-in.-diameter cylindrical reactor with a 5–10 ns high voltage (30 kV) pulse generator together with applied DC bias voltages up to 10 kV. The distribution of nanoparticle sizes was measured using a scanning mobility particle sizer (SMPS) with diameter centered around 225 nm. Here, the main mechanism of remediation occurs in a two-step process in which the oil nanoparticles are first ionized by the free electrons and free radicals in the plasma and then the charged particles are swept out to the sidewalls of the reactor by the applied DC potential. We believe this general approach opens up new degrees of freedom in the design of electrostatic oil aerosol pollution control devices.

Graphical abstract

Keywords

Nanoparticles; Transient plasma; Charbroiler emission; DC bias; Remediation

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