Adsorption of mercury vapor using iron oxides nanoparticles and subsequent recovery via electrochemistry

English Abstract:

Mercury is a neurotoxic metal which occurs naturally in the earth’s crust and is also released from various anthropogenic activities like coal combustion and metal smelting. Elemental mercury (Hg⁰) can easily vaporize and be inhaled into human’s body. Also, elemental mercury vapor can easily form the methylmercury which is the most toxic of the most toxic of the organic forms and can easily spread into the ecosystem. It is thus of great importance and interest to develop an efficient and recyclable system for the treatment and recycling of element mercury. In our studies, we aim to develop a mercury remediation system using naturally occurring materials. Meanwhile, by combination with an electrochemical regeneration method, the sorbents and mercury can be highly recycled with energy efficient and low cost. Selected physical and chemical properties of nano-sorbents are analyzed by using high-resolution transmission electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, NanoScan and Brunauer-Emmett-Teller. Gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC-MS) and cold vapour atomic fluorescence spectroscopy (CVAFS) are used to estimate the removal efficiency and electrochemical regeneration efficiency of mercury vapor. The specific results will be presented in the conference and the impact will be discussed.