The drinking water industry is faced with microbial contaminants that are challenging to
remove or inactivate with conventional treatment technologies. Specialized and often
costly technologies are required to treat particularly challenging target compounds such
as protozoan pathogens (e.g., Cryptosporidium parvum) and viruses (e.g., adenovirus).
Pulsed arc electrohydraulic discharge (PAED) is a direct plasma technology that has the
potential to treat and/or inactive these microorganisms. Plasma technologies have the
capability to treat water by several mechanisms including: shock waves, ultraviolet (UV) irradiation,
radical reactions, electron processes, ionic reactions, and thermal dissociation (Chang et
al., 2002). The advantage of utilizing direct plasma technologies such as PAED is that
they are capable of simultaneously taking advantage of all of these mechanisms.
Preliminary experiments using a laboratory-scale PAED were conducted to evaluate
Escherichia coli and Bacillus subtilis inactivation with PAED. Preliminary data
indicated that the mean log<sub>10</sub> inactivation of E. coli was 0, 2.6, 3.3, and 3.6 log at
detention times of 0, 0.8, 1.5, and 5.8 minutes respectively. The frequency of
electrohydraulic discharges was changed for a second trial yielding similar inactivation of
E. coli of 0, 0.06, 1.4, and 2.82 log with corresponding detention times of 0, 0.3, 0.9, and
1.3 minutes, respectively. The mean B. subtilis inactivation after 0.9 and 1.3 minutes was
3.5 and 4.6 log, respectively.
Pulsed arc electrohydraulic discharge offers an innovative approach that may offer
concurrent treatment of microbial and chemical target compounds. The emergence of
PAED technology as a viable treatment option will offer another effective barrier in a
multi-barrier treatment system to ensure public health needs are met. Includes 8 references, figures.
| Edition : | Vol. - No. |
| File Size : | 1
file
, 360 KB |
| Note : | This product is unavailable in Ukraine, Russia, Belarus |
| Number of Pages : | 6 |
| Published : | 06/17/2004 |
