Hot-melted asphalt (HMA) plants use sized gravels, asphalt and/or recycled asphalt as raw materials. In the plant, the materials are heated to certain preset temperatures and blended at fixed ratios at around 170oC to prepare the required HMA for road paving. In the asphalt-melting, hot-blending and dumping operations, fumes and particulates emit from the process equipments. The emitted gases contain various volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and poly aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) which are harmful to the health of the plant workers and nearby residents. Complaints from the residents also come with the fume and odorous emissions.
In this study, an oxidation-reduction-in-series scrubbing process was tested to remove odorous compounds in waste gases emitted from HMA plants. Waste gas samples for test were collected from the vent hole of an oven which contains a heated sample of asphalt or recycled asphalt concrete. Sodium hypochlorite solution was used to scrub and oxidize the compounds and hydrogen peroxide to reduce the chlorine emitted from the oxidative scrubber. A gas chromatography with a mass spectrophotometric detector (GC-MSD) was used for the identification of the odorous species and their concentrations in the waste gases. Sensory tests were also used to determine the odor removal efficiency.
GC-MSD examination results indicates that alkanes, arenes, alkenes, halides, esters, and carbonyl compounds were detected in the test gas. Scrubbing test results indicate that with oxidative solution of 50-60 mg/L residual chlorine at pH 7.0-7.5 and reductive solution of 35 mg/L hydrogen peroxide at pH >12, over 90% of the VOCs in the tested gas could be removed. Odor intensities could be reduced from 3,090 (expressed as dilutions to threshold) to 73. Pungent asphalt odor in the test gas was turned into slight sulfur smell after the scrubbing.
For removing the odors from 500 Nm3/min of the flue gas vented from a HMA plant, an analysis indicates the required total cost for chemicals (sodium hypochlorite solution, hydrogen peroxide and sodium hydroxide) added to the scrubbers was around 2,800 NT$/day (US$ 95/day) for a daily operation time of 10 hours. The cost is far lower than that by the traditional thermal incineration one (25,000 NT$/day or US$ 850/day) or by the regenerative thermal oxidation (RTO) one (14,300 NT$/day or US$ 485/day). This study has successfully developed an economical and effective chemical scrubbing technology for the removal of odorous compounds in gases emitted from HMA plants.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:NSYSU/oai:NSYSU:etd-0811111-144434 |
| Date | 11 August 2011 |
| Creators | Chen, Po-cheng |
| Contributors | Wen-Hsi Cheng, Ming-Shean Chou, Mei-Juan Wu |
| Publisher | NSYSU |
| Source Sets | NSYSU Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Archive |
| Language | Cholon |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.lib.nsysu.edu.tw/ETD-db/ETD-search/view_etd?URN=etd-0811111-144434 |
| Rights | user_define, Copyright information available at source archive |
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