Using circular economy principles to recycle materials in guiding the design of a wet scrubber-reactor for indoor air disinfection from coronavirus and other pathogens

Andrei Shishkin; Gaurav Goel; Janis Baronins; Jurijs Ozolins; Clare Hoskins; Saurav Goel

doi:10.1016/j.eti.2021.101429

Using circular economy principles to recycle materials in guiding the design of a wet scrubber-reactor for indoor air disinfection from coronavirus and other pathogens

Environ Technol Innov. 2021 May:22:101429. doi: 10.1016/j.eti.2021.101429. Epub 2021 Feb 12.

Authors

Andrei Shishkin¹, Gaurav Goel^{2

3}, Janis Baronins⁴, Jurijs Ozolins¹, Clare Hoskins⁵, Saurav Goel^{2

3

6}

Affiliations

¹ Rudolfs Cimdins Riga Biomaterials Innovations and Development Centre of RTU, Institute of General Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Materials Science and Applied Chemistry, Riga Technical University, LV 1007, Riga, Latvia.
² School of Engineering, London South Bank University, SE1 0AA, UK.
³ School of Aerospace, Transport & Manufacturing, Cranfield University, MK43 0AL, UK.
⁴ Maritime Transport department, Latvian Maritime Academy, 12, k-1, Flotes Str., Riga, LV 1016, Latvia.
⁵ Pure and Applied Chemistry, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, G1 1RD, UK.
⁶ Department of Mechanical Engineering, Shiv Nadar University, Gautam Budh Nagar, 201314, India.

Abstract

An arduous need exists to discover rapid solutions to avoid the accelerated spread of coronavirus especially through the indoor environments like offices, hospitals, and airports. One such measure could be to disinfect the air, especially in indoor environments. The goal of this work is to propose a novel design of a wet scrubber-reactor to deactivate airborne microbes using circular economy principles. Based on Fenton's reaction mechanism, the system proposed here will deactivate airborne microbes (bioaerosols) such as SARS-CoV-2. The proposed design relies on using a highly porous clay-glass open-cell structure as an easily reproducible and cheap material. The principle behind this technique is an in-situ decomposition of hydrogen peroxide into highly reactive oxygen species and free radicals. The high porosity of a tailored ceramic structure provides a high contact area between atomized oxygen, free radicals and supplied polluted air. The design is shown to comply with the needs of achieving sustainable development goals.

Keywords: Air disinfection; COVID-19; Coronavirus; Porous ceramics; Preparedness; Scrubber-reactor.