Packed bed absorbers are often used to treat gaseous emissions for reasonably large gas flow rates ranging from a few thousand cfm to greater than 70,000 cfm. Common emissions include SOx, HCl, HF, and NOx. The absorbers are often custom engineered for a specific plants and have been used for secondary lead smelters, geothermal power plants, waste oil-re-refiners, ceramic tile manufacturing, waste incinerators, and ethanol plants. The types of emission sources range from thermal oxidizers, regenerative thermal oxidizers (RTO’s), furnaces, kilns, direct fired heaters, incinerators, fermenters, vent tanks, and batch mixers.
Envitech developed a lab scrubber to provide an economic solution for smaller gas flow rate applications. The lab scrubber is a packaged unit designed for high efficiency of water soluble contaminants and can handle up to 2,000 cfm of gas at a maximum temperature of 180°F. The system is engineered for reduced footprint at 4 ft x 4 ft and includes a pre-wired control panel and pre-piped service utility connections requiring minimal installation and maintenance costs. Scrubber units are configurable to different levels of automation and treatment applications.
A recent lab scrubber is for a manufacturer of pharmaceutical products in Southern, California. The scrubber is designed to remove HCl from the exhaust of several small laboratory process vent streams. The vent streams includes low organic concentrations which are incompatible with many common plastic materials. Special resin was selected for the fiber reinforced plastic (FRP) vessel and ductwork. Piping and valves were assembled using PVDF. The scrubber is designed for a classified area with explosion proof motors and instruments and is provided as a turn-key installation.
Another example is a process vent scrubber for a blending facility in South Carolina that produces crop protection products for agricultural markets. The vent stream is 1,500 cfm and includes HCl and water soluble particulate greater than 3 micron in size. The Envitech lab scrubber was configured to include a low pressure drop Venturi for particulate control combined with a packed bed absorber for HCl control. The system includes instruments, control system, recirculation pump, pre-assembled piping, valves, and fittings, interconnect duct, ID fan, and stack.
A different use for a lab scrubber includes an ethylenediamine (EDA) scrubber installed in the South Eastern United States. The storage of this precursor chemical requires extra handling than is typical with other common industrial chemicals. With a relatively low exposure limit of 10 ppm, storage tanks must be properly engineered and scrubbed to remove excess vapors. The Envitech lab scrubber is an ideal, low cost solution for this type of storage system.
Please click on the link below to download a brochure and case studies for the lab scrubber.