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Ozone and scentlok

drew13

Well-Known Member
Joined
Sep 11, 2014
Messages
1,095
Location
Maine
Pretty sure I've read all of the ozone and scentlok care threads threads on here and I still have a question...

What is the best way to use ozone to regenerate scentlok? Ozone gas only? Ozone gas then wash? Ozone infused in wash water?

Thoughts and experiences?
Thanks,
Drew




Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Ozone does not regenerate ScentLok. The heat from your Dryer reactivates the carbon woven into the fabric. Ozone is another scent elimination product that neutralizes odors. ScentLok "captures" odors and Ozone kills it. Hope that makes sense.
 
Actually, ozone does regenerate activated carbon by two mechanisms:
1. Complete mineralization of adsorbed molecules to carbon dioxide
2. Oxidation of adsorbed molecules to more polar molecules (e.g. acids, alcohols, aldehydes, etx). These polar molecules are more readily removed from the clothing during wash cycles.

Unfortunately, ozone also oxidizes the activated carbon resulting in an increase in acid functional groups on the activated carbon as well as a reduction in the active surface area. This results in a general degradation in adsorptive performance / scent reduction if the garment is repeatedly subjected to high doses of ozone.
 
BassBoysLLP said:
Actually, ozone does regenerate activated carbon by two mechanisms:
1. Complete mineralization of adsorbed molecules to carbon dioxide
2. Oxidation of adsorbed molecules to more polar molecules (e.g. acids, alcohols, aldehydes, etx). These polar molecules are more readily removed from the clothing during wash cycles.

Unfortunately, ozone also oxidizes the activated carbon resulting in an increase in acid functional groups on the activated carbon as well as a reduction in the active surface area. This results in a general degradation in adsorptive performance / scent reduction if the garment is repeatedly subjected to high doses of ozone.
:thumbup: As soon as I started reading this question I was hoping you would hop on to answer it!
 
BassBoysLLP said:
Actually, ozone does regenerate activated carbon by two mechanisms:
1. Complete mineralization of adsorbed molecules to carbon dioxide
2. Oxidation of adsorbed molecules to more polar molecules (e.g. acids, alcohols, aldehydes, etx). These polar molecules are more readily removed from the clothing during wash cycles.

Unfortunately, ozone also oxidizes the activated carbon resulting in an increase in acid functional groups on the activated carbon as well as a reduction in the active surface area. This results in a general degradation in adsorptive performance / scent reduction if the garment is repeatedly subjected to high doses of ozone.

Well that escalated quickly.

I don't use ozone so I should have let the grown ups (BassBoys) answer the OP. :D :D
 
Re: RE: Re: Ozone and scentlok

g2outdoors said:
BassBoysLLP said:
Actually, ozone does regenerate activated carbon by two mechanisms:
1. Complete mineralization of adsorbed molecules to carbon dioxide
2. Oxidation of adsorbed molecules to more polar molecules (e.g. acids, alcohols, aldehydes, etx). These polar molecules are more readily removed from the clothing during wash cycles.

Unfortunately, ozone also oxidizes the activated carbon resulting in an increase in acid functional groups on the activated carbon as well as a reduction in the active surface area. This results in a general degradation in adsorptive performance / scent reduction if the garment is repeatedly subjected to high doses of ozone.

Well that escalated quickly.

I don't use ozone so I should have let the grown ups (BassBoys) answer the OP. :D :D
I have an unfair advantage on the subject.
 
GREAT info, BassBoys. Thanks!

Based on the "it works but it also degrades the capacity if subjected to high doses repeatedly" info - is it best then to not do it at all or perhaps use ozone only before a wash (which should only be 1-3 times per year anyway)?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
drew13 said:
GREAT info, BassBoys. Thanks!

Based on the "it works but it also degrades the capacity if subjected to high doses repeatedly" info - is it best then to not do it at all or perhaps use ozone only before a wash (which should only be 1-3 times per year anyway)?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I'd use ozone before each wash and stick with dryer most of the time.
 
1. Complete mineralization of adsorbed molecules to carbon dioxide

Huh? I happen to have a background in molecular biology and chemistry, and I also worked a little with ozone on my job lately.

However, I have absolutely no idea what "complete mineralization to carbon dioxide" is supposed to mean.

According to wikipedia:
Mineralization may refer to:
Mineralization (biology), the process through which an organic substance becomes impregnated by inorganic substances - nope.
Mineralization (geology), the hydrothermal deposition of economically important metals in the formation of ore bodies or lodes - hardly.
Mineralization (soil science), the release of plant-available compounds such as ammonium during decomposition - uhhh.. no.

Nothing here that seems to fit even remotely.

Maybe 'mineralization' is actually supposed to mean 'degradation'? But then, to carbon dioxide (=CO2)... How is that supposed to work? And where do all the other elements that are contained in the 'smelly' molecules (nitrogen comes to mind as just one example of many...) go?

Then there is the issue with the reactivity of ozone with the activated carbon: assuming that there are several orders of magnitude more of that activated carbon in these clothes than there are bound scent molecules (not certain this is true, but for the clothes to work there would have to be), wouldn't that mean that almost all of the ozone would react with the carbon (thereby deactivating both the carbon and the ozone) before it even has a chance to get to whatever is bound?

It would be great if someone could elaborate, I am always eager to learn, especially as I have been trying for a couple of years now to make up my mind about all the different scent control "solutions" out there...
 
Most of your last question comes down to kinetics. The vast majority of scent molecules are relatively labile compared to the activated carbon so the reduction of scent molecules is preferentially favored. I've used this approach in designing systems for removal of select components in contaminated streams present in oil refineries and ethylene plants. The effective oxidant (e.g. ozone) dose is often 2-3 times the stoichiometric requirement based on the amount of labile compounds in the stream, not the total oxidation demand of the process stream.
 
Hi Bass,

Thanks for getting back to me! This is pretty interesting as it actually forces me to look into a whole bunch of things I thought I had a much better understanding of than I actually have!

I looked up the link you posted:
"Mineralization in soil science is decomposition or oxidation of the chemical compounds in organic matter into plant-accessible forms"

If I understand this correctly this means that the molecules are oxidized NOT to be completely degraded to CO2, but to plant-accessible forms (though why the oxidation would make them more plant accessible is not immediately apparent from the link; maybe it's a polarity thing?). As there are no plants growing in your scent control suit (I hope), I don't see how that would necessarily help.

The same process (oxidation) might make some molecules less "smelly" by means of changing their molecular structure (by adding oxygen); however, other molecules will be rendered more smelly (rancidification of fats comes to mind).

Now I do know that ozone works and is used in a lot of applications every day. What I am struggling with is the amount (both in terms of time and concentration) that would be necessary to actually have an effect on a complex mixture of smelly molecules. This is directly linked to the question of how much damage that amount of ozone would do to the the fabric of the clothes the we are trying to clean (or to the hunter sitting underneath her ozonics unit) in that same amount of time (ozone is not picky when it comes to what it latches on to).

I will go out on a limb here and say that I think total breakdown of organic molecules all the way to CO2 simply by exposing them to an oxidizing environment (ozone) at ambient temperature is unrealistic in our scenario. However, that does not mean it won't be good enough to have an impact.

I am pretty tempted to get myself a decent small ozone generator and some smelly compound (I thought of butyric acid, but that might stack the deck too much in favour of ozone as it really likes to react with oxygen) and run a few tests. My guess would be anything containing rubber and plastic is not going to fare very well at significant concentrations of ozone, but I might be wrong...

Let me think (and read!) about this a little bit...
 
Youre digging too deep. Carbon dioxide is a plant accessible form. CO2 + Water + Light yields oxygen and carbohydrate via photosynthesis.

You are correct that there is always a residual following ozonation. Low molecular weight organic acids like oxalic and acetic acid tend to persist. I see this repeatedly when we do material balances on pilot reactors. The good news is these low molecular weight organic acids have a very low affinity for the activated carbon (see the isotherms) and are easily removed with a wash cycle.
 
BassBoysLLP said:
Youre digging too deep. Carbon dioxide is a plant accessible form. CO2 + Water + Light yields oxygen and carbohydrate via photosynthesis.

You are correct that there is always a residual following ozonation. Low molecular weight organic acids like oxalic and acetic acid tend to persist. I see this repeatedly when we do material balances on pilot reactors. The good news is these low molecular weight organic acids have a very low affinity for the activated carbon (see the isotherms) and are easily removed with a wash cycle.

Correct, CO2 is the input molecule for photosynthesis, but not in roots inside the soil, which is what the soil science mineralization is talking about. No chlorophyll in roots (white, not green) equals no photosynthesis. Actually, that whole wikipedia entry is very confusing to me, as I have the feeling that the mineralization is actually referring to nitrogen, not carbohydrates et al. This would also make more sense, as plants need to acquire nitrogen through their roots (while there is N2 in the atmosphere, this form is not usable by plants). But I digress...

You seem to have waaaaay more practical experience with ozonation than I do, it appears (I have only recently started dabbling in it). As I understand you are using ozone in confined spaces (reactors) to degrade organic compounds? Would you have an example of the kinetics of such an application? Like starting molecule concentration - ozone concentration - time of ozonation at given concentration and temperature - residual amounts of target compound (and potentially identities and concentration of product compounds) at end of ozonation?

That would be exactly the info we need to then compare it with the output of ozone generators marketed in the hunting sector to see how they compare...

Unfortunately I am travelling to a conference this weekend and part of next week (writing this sitting at the gate), but I will try to find some time to look into this more along the way. I will also have to look into how exactly activated carbon binds targets on a molecular level (for example, if they attach to the outside to the carbon particles that would work in favour of the ozone application, as the target compounds could form a sort of protective layer around the carbon and be preferentially degraded...)

This is actually pretty fun (in a very nerdy kind of way)
 
:lol: You like to argue.

Maybe we need to add another definition to wikipedia for clarification. Regardless, mineralization is a common term used to describe oxidation of organics. 2 minute google search, read this abstract...last sentence. Its a standard term...

https://www.researchgate.net/publicatio ... _additives

Kinetics is seconds to hours. Really depends on what you are trying to oxidize.

Typical dose is generally at least 3 times the stoichiometric requirement. These ozone generators kick out a ton of ozone...way more than the stoichiometric requirement. Most ones guys are using kick out 7-15 GRAMS of ozone per day.

The adsorption is a surface phenomenon. See Van der Waals forces.

Don't want to come off as a D. I'm a Ph.D. chemical engineer that designs this stuff for a living. I do my best to manage peoples expectations regarding scent elimination technologies.
 
Can we get a Too Long Didn't Read (TL;DR) version? :)

All I want to know is if o should add an ozone generator to my toolbox or not?

On a related note we are in the process of building our house and I already have designs for my scent free closet off the garage.


-Sent from d_mobile
 
d_rek said:
Can we get a Too Long Didn't Read (TL;DR) version? :)

On a related note we are in the process of building our house and I already have designs for my scent free closet off the garage.

So True! Regarding the scent free closet...pics or it didn't happen ;)

Gr33n Arrow said:
Yup... what they said!

LOL :lol: :lol: :lol:
 
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