Ozone can do more than disinfection and oxidation of chemical contaminates. Ozone can also be used as a flocculant to aid in filtration of metals from water. It is common to use ozone to remove iron and manganese from water, but what about other metals?
The paper shown below provides confirmation that ozone has the ability to also remove Lead, Copper, Arsenic, Zinc, and Cadmium from water. Using ozone for per-treatment and filtration these metals were all removed from water at varying degrees dependent upon ozone dosage rate and filtration efficiency.
This is one more application for ozone in drinking water applications, and potentially for groundwater remediation applications.
Read abstract for paper below, link to purchase entire paper here
Pilot Testing Of Trace Metals Removal With Ozone At Snowbird Ski Resort
| Author | Eva Nieminski, Doug Evans |
| Year | 1995 |
| Location | Volume 17 Issue 3 Pages 297 – 309 |
| DOI | 10.1080/01919519508547537 |
A pilot study at the Snowbird Ski Resort in Utah evaluated feasibility of ozonation replacing chlorine and sulfur dioxide for oxidation of iron and manganese in groundwater. Ozonation also was tested for the removal of lead and cadmium, occurring at concentrations exceeding drinking water Maximum Contaminant Levels. An ozone dose of 2 mg/L, contacted with the water for 1 minute prior to filtration, was selected as optimum for iron and manganese removal from 0.4 mg/L and 40 microg/L, respectively, to below detection limits. Lead, copper, and arsenic also were removed to below detection limits. The removal of cadmium and zinc improved when ozone was contacted for 10 minutes. With metals removal through ozonation and filtration, taste and odor enhancement also were reported.
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Right on with your article. Watson Well in Northern California has been building water treatment skid systems using ozone as the oxidizer for some time now. Ozone gives us many additional benefits besides heavy metal and mineral removal. It’s an awesome disinfectant of pathogen bacteria, removes biofilm from water lines, pumps, storage tanks, and it is the best way to provide super saturated disolved oxygen in water for commercial growers.
Are portable, home based ozone generators that use ambient air powerful enough to remove these metals from very cold tap water, or might these units only remove organic pollutants from cold water? I have been using these units for a couple of decades. Please reply via email.
Thanks.
The ozone generated from an ambient air ozone generator would not be sufficient to dissolve ozone into water. The concentration of ozone is too low to acheive any appreciable solubility of ozone gas into water. You should use a high-concentration ozone generator that creates the same production rate of ozone, but at a much lower flow-rate, therefore a higher concentration that can properly dissolve into water.
Ozone concentration is a factor in solubility of ozone into water. Learn more about ozone solubility at link below:
https://www.oxidationtech.com/ozone/solubility.html