Factors affecting aromatic VOC removal by electron beam treatment

A study has been conducted to investigate the effects of dose, humidity, and temperature on the decomposition of representative volatile organic compounds (VOCs) by electron beam irradiation. For this study, toluene-a commonly used VOC in the various industrial coating processes, was selected as a representative VOC. The degradation characteristics under different concentrations and irradiation doses were extensively investigated to determine and improve VOC removal efficiencies. In general, this study illustrates that the removal efficiencies of aromatic VOCs increase as their concentrations decrease and the irradiation doses increase. Addition of water vapor and/or aerosol moisture into the reactor of a flow system results in 10-20% increase in VOC removal efficiencies compared to the experiments run without moisture added, presumably due to OH radical formation leading to additional degradation pathways. The level of decomposition was higher with the addition of water vapor compared to those observed with added aerosol moisture. The temperature variations from 30degreesC to 130degreesC did not significantly affect the decomposition rates of the toluene compound at 160 ppm C. However, there was a significant decrease in toluene decomposition rate at a higher temperature of 170degreesC. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.