Monitoring of airborne C discharge at RI facilities; A Comparison of collection and oxidation methods

Ueno, Yumi ; Koarashi, Jun   ; Iwai, Yasunori; Sato, Junya ; Takahashi, Teruhiko; Sawahata, Katsunori; Sekita, Tsutomu ; Kobayashi, Makoto ; Tsunoda, Masahiko ; Kikuchi, Masamitsu

The Japan Atomic Energy Agency has conducted a monthly monitoring of airborne C discharge at the forth research building (RI facility) of the Tokai Research and Development Center. In the current monitoring, C, which exists in various chemical forms in airborne effluent, is converted into CO with CuO catalyst and then collected using monoethanolamine (MEA) as CO absorbent. However, this collection method has some issues on safety management because the CuO catalyst requires a high heating temperature (600C) to ensure a high oxidation efficiency and the MEA is specified as a poisonous and deleterious substance. To establish a safer, manageable and reliable method for monitoring airborne C discharge, we examined collection methods that use different CO absorbents (MEA and Carbo-Sorb E) and oxidation catalysts (CuO, Pt/Alumina and Pd/ZrO). The results showed 100% CO collection efficiency of MEA during a 30-day sampling period under the condition tested. In contrast, Carbo-Sorb E was found to be unsuitable for the monthly-long CO collection because of its high volatile nature. Among the oxidation catalysts, the Pd/ZrO showed the highest oxidation efficiency for CH at a lower temperature.