ENHANCEMENT OF NOX ADSORPTION CAPACITY AND RATE OF CHAR BY MICROWAVES

The NOX were adsorbed into a char bed and then reduced by the microwaves to nitrogen and carbon oxides. High removal rates of NOX-near 98%-were observed in laboratory tests. A series of experiments were conducted to find the effect that microwave-induced regeneration of NOX saturated char had on the NOX adsorption capacity of char and the resulting adsorption rate. During the 9-cycle adsorption and reduction experiments, the adsorption capacity of char increased from 10 to 30 g NOX per 100 g char. The microwave-induced regeneration also significantly increased the rate of NOX adsorption on char. As a result, the initial breakthrough time of NOX increased from 0.01 hour for the fresh char bed to 14 hours for the char bed from the fourth microwave-induced regeneration cycle when the average residence time of gas was 2.2 seconds. The surface area of the char was increased from 82 m(2)/g to 800 m(2)/g after 9 cycles of adsorption and regeneration.