What is Ozone Disinfection？4 Quality Pionts Tell U

What is ozone disinfection? What are the characteristics? How does ozone disinfection kill COVID-19 in our daily life? Let’s read on.

Let’s dive right in now, and you can click on the question that interest you,

1. Advantages:

2. Disadvantages:

3. Notes

4. Characteristic

What is ozone?

The molecular formula of ozone is O₃. A sky-blue fishy odor gas, dark black in liquid form and blue-black in solid form. Ozone is found mainly in the ozone layer in the lower stratosphere, 20 km from the Earth’s surface. It absorbs, blocks, and weakens shortwave ultraviolet rays that are harmful to the body, preventing them from reaching the Earth.

Advantages:

Ozone disinfection is a lysis level method, complete sterilization, no residue, broad-spectrum sterilization, can kill bacterial propagules and budding spores, viruses, fungi, etc., and can destroy botulinum toxin. O3 is a non-polluting disinfectant because it can quickly diffuse into the whole sterilization space and sterilize the dead space. The traditional sterilization methods, whether ultraviolet light, or chemical fumigation, are not thorough, have dead ends, heavy workload, have residual contamination or odor, and have the potential to harm human health. If disinfected with ultraviolet light, it is ineffective in places where the light does not reach and has disadvantages such as decline, weak penetration, and lack of longevity. Chemical fumigation also suffers from shortcomings, such as poor bactericidal effects against highly resistant bacteria and viruses.

Reactive oxygen (ozone) sterilization is recognized worldwide as a green, broad-spectrum, highly effective sterilizing agent due to its strong oxidizing properties. Widely used for drinking water disinfection, air disinfection in health care institutions, ozone is automatically reduced to oxygen after 30-40 minutes, with no chemical residual secondary contamination. The fields of application are sterilization cabinets, fruit, and vegetable detoxification machine, gynecological treatment instrument, food processing, drinking water filling sterilization equipment, etc.

Disadvantages:

Large investment, high cost than chlorination disinfection; O3 in water is unstable, control and detection of O3 require certain technology; after disinfection of the pipeline has a corrosive effect, so there is no remaining O3 in the factory water, so the need for a second disinfectant; and iron, manganese, organic matter, and other reactions, can produce micro-flocculation so that the turbidity of water; ozone oxidation of raw water containing bromine ions will produce bromate root. Bromate has been classified as a Class 2B potential carcinogen by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), the WHO recommends a maximum bromate concentration of 25 μg/L for drinking water, and the USEPA drinking water standard sets a maximum permissible concentration of 10 μg/L. Bromate formation during ozone oxidation can be achieved through both ozone oxidation and ozone/hydroxyl radical oxidation, and control of bromate can be achieved by controlling both its formation and its removal after formation. pH reduction, ammonia addition, chlorine-ammonia process, and optimized oxidation conditions are ways to control bromate formation, which can be removed by physical, chemical, and biological methods after bromate formation. Therefore, the balance between ozone, pathogens, and bromates requires further exploration of the ozone sterilization mechanism and bromate control methods.

Notes：

Ozone on the human respiratory tract mucous membrane irritation, air ozone concentration of 0.15ppm, you can smell; according to international standards, up to 0.5-1ppm can cause discomfort such as dry mouth; up to 1-4ppm can cause cough; up to 4-10ppm can cause strong cough. The air must be disinfected with ozone in the absence of a person and must be disinfected for at least 30 minutes before entering.
Ozone is a strong oxidizer, damage to a variety of items, the higher the concentration of damage to items heavier, can make the copper sheet green rust spot, rubber aging, discoloration, elasticity is reduced, resulting in brittle, fracture, fabric bleaching fading, etc.

Characteristic：

The O3 sterilization method has the following characteristics compared to conventional sterilization methods:

Efficient. Ozone sterilization is done with air as a medium and does not require any other auxiliary materials or additives. The body is inclusive, thoroughly sterilized, with the strong function of removing mold, fishy, odor, and other odors.
High cleanliness. The rapid decomposition of ozone into oxygen is a unique advantage of ozone as a sterilizer. Ozone is produced by using oxygen in the air. During the disinfection process, the excess oxygen is combined into oxygen molecules after 30 minutes, without any residue, solving the problem of secondary contamination caused by the disinfection method, while eliminating the need to clean again after the disinfection.
Convenience. Ozone sterilizers are typically installed in cleanrooms or air purification systems or in sterilization chambers (e.g. ozone cabinets, transfer windows, etc.). The sterilizer can be set to turn on and run on time according to the sterilization concentration and time verified by commissioning, which is easy to use.
Economy. By comparing the use and operation of O3 sterilization in many pharmaceutical industries and medical and health units, the ozone sterilization method has great economic and social benefits compared with other methods. Environmental issues are particularly important in today’s rapidly growing industry, and ozone disinfection avoids secondary contamination from other disinfection methods.