The “Smog Eater”

SmoRTech Pty Ltd (short for Smog Removal Technologies) is a start-up organisation, made up of a team of exceptional Engineers in a range of disciplines, who have as their Core Purpose:

“To make a signiﬁcant contribution to the removal of airborne pollutants (smog) and improve people’s lives”

Reasons to Believe

SmoRTech is evaluating the principles of a facility (“Smog Eater”) aimed at removing pollutants where it has the greatest impact (cities and areas of accumulation affecting human health).
Anticipating positive results from early chemical and CFD simulation models testing various scenarios to assess validity of the airﬂow hypothesis and chemical principles.
Early research indicates technology highly feasible in delivering social, environmental, and economic beneﬁt to a range of interested and affected parties.
Progressing to design, build and test prototypes, believed to be achievable in relatively short timeframe and at reasonable cost due to the simplicity of design.

Dramatic Difference

Principles of the facility (powered exclusively by solar energy) is simple, leveraging natural airﬂow, thermody- namics and hydrodynamics.
The pollution capturing mechanism is based on natural, non-toxic and inert chemicals within an aqueous medium, with ﬁnal residues removable and potentially re-usable.
Smog Eater is a highly sustainable facility, easy to construct, disassemble and relocate, with a fairly small surface footprint.
Simplicity of the facility permits low construction and operating cost, with opportunity for a collaborative network of “Smog Eaters” in high pollution hot spots.

Benefits to Stakeholders

Believed to provide signiﬁcant social and environmental beneﬁts in locations near the “Smog Eaters” via improved human wellbeing and associated relief in med- ical care and health systems.

Carbon and related pollutant credits could offer opportunity to large polluting corporations with environmental obligations to assist or collaborate in developing or adopting such facilities.

Political imperative and beneﬁts to governments (local and national) to adopt highly attractive and low production cost solution.

Accumulated low-lying polluted air & smog (CO_x, SO_x, NO_x, Volatile Organic Components) originating from vehicle exhaust and industrial emissions

Pollution drawn into the bottom of the facility through grated inlet vents via natural airflow under temperature differential

Polluted air mixing with water-based medium that captures pollution particles and transfers it from the air into the liquid medium

Chemical reaction section to neutralise acids and convert captured components >> separate unit to access, remove & transport chemicals

Solar panels to power augmented airflow, recirculation water pump, fans, sensors, and other devices

Expelled clean air with harmful pollutants removed or significantly reduced

What makes our product different?

95% of similar pollution removal devices of similar size are based on dry scrubbing – ours is a wet system
Most wet scrubbing systems are very large, fixed to locations of pollution generation – ours is smaller, scalable and mobile or semi-fixed.
Wet system does not need filter replacement like HEPA¹ filters in HVAC² systems – cost saving
Our system does not have an inline filter but filters separate from flow network – more energy efficient
Wet system does not just capture PM but also gasses (those soluble in water + catalysts)

Our synthetic mesh filter solution is washable and reusable – sustainable
Easy and low cost maintenance
Integrated sensors for ongoing performance monitoring and feedback using IOT technology
Design includes manifold structure to maximise air/water flow interaction
Highly adaptable, scalable, scopeable to many different use cases

¹ HEPA – high-efficiency particulate absorbing

² HVAC – Heating, ventilation, and air conditioning

Product evolution

Computer modelling (2020)

During 2020, SmoRTech embarked on a series of computer simulation testing projects using computational fluid dynamics (CFD) to model and test some of out hypotheses around the viability and efficiency of using a wet scrubbing approach for capturing and removing airborne pollutants.
SmoRTech engaged Qantur Technologies, specialists in air flow modelling to generate a three-dimensional Computed Aided Design (CAD) model for our early smog stack column concept.
Using ANSYS Fluent simulation software the model constructed was used to solve the continuity, momentum, turbulence kinetic energy, turbulence energy dissipation rate, as well as the species transport equations with a discrete phase model to capture the absorptivity from water to the pollutant gases using an un-structured mesh of tetrahedrons with 3 million cells for the simulation.
The simulation considered six phases in which the primary phase is water liquid, and five additional secondary phases representing different pollutant gases and particulates (CO₂, NO₂, NO, SO₂, PM2.5)
Multiple simulations were carried out for 25 seconds, assuming as initial condition for the velocity field the normal configuration of inlet and outlet of the stack and the velocity and pressure loss were calculated
The results from this test phase were very promising showing a significant reduction in the volume fractions of all the contaminants after a very short residence time (1.6 seconds) and total removal of all volume fractions after only 21 seconds.
The model also assessed airflow dynamics which showed initial eddy/vortex formation in the lower part of the stack but indicating stabilization and eventual reversion to straight laminar flow after a short interval.
The results of the CAD modelling showed enormous promise and encouraged SmoRTech to progress to build a physical prototype to test the concept in a real environment.

Proof of Concept (2021)

Following the promising results from the 2020 CFD simulation testing SmoRTech decided to progress building a physical prototype during Q2 of 2021 and embarked on testing in Q4 of 2021.
The physical prototype was built up from modular units (cubes), constructed from marine grade plywood with glass windows allowing observation of airflow and wet scrubber dynamics.
The vertical stack consisted of four stacked hollow cubes 1x1x1.2m in dimension, eventually reaching up to close to five m height.
A 1m diameter reversible flow direction and speed-controlled extraction/ fan was installed at the top of the stack.
A wet scrubbing network of pipes and spray nozzles was installed inside the stack connected to a water pump at the bottom and connected to a water collection sump. The wet scrubbing solution was recycled through the sprayer system.
Various pollution agents were introduced into the air at the bottom of the stack. The polluted air was sucked in from the bottom of the stack and pulled upwards through the column, interacting with the wet scrubbing system spaying downwards, which removed the pollutants in the air.
Sensor units (stations) were positioned at the inlet and outlet containing various sensors for testing concentrations of gasses (CO, CO₂, NO, SO₂), particulate matter (PM10 and PM2.5) and ambient metrics (temperature, humidity, airflow speed).
The objective of positioning the sensor stations at the inlet and outlet was to determine how effective the wet scrubbing system is in removing airborne pollutants.
During the prototype testing a large volume of sensor data was generated and captured from assessing various types of pollutants under varying conditions (different airflow speeds, different pollutant concentrations).

Following the testing phase, the sensor data was compiled, analysed and interpreted.
The most interesting and conclusive results from the testing that confirms our beliefs in the efficiency of the technology is captured in the graphs adjacent.
This specific test ran for around 60 minutes during which we varied fan speed, pump intensity and pollutant concentration.
In the specific area (in the red box) we switched on the wet scrubbing system as well as the pollution supply.
The orange and blues lines are the data recordings from the two inlet sensors which recorded PM2.5 levels. The grey and yellow lines show the PM2.5 levels recorded at the outlet i.e. after having been scrubbed (the reason they deviate is because the sensors were not pre-calibrated with one another hence the data represent the “raw” captured recordings. However, the deviation does not detract from the validity of our findings and conclusions).
The PM2.5 levels have reduced from levels of around 2000-2500 down to levels of around 800, thus by about 70%.
Our testing facilities and prototype was very basic and the testing conditions were far from ideal – we were therefore quite surprised to achieve such good results
We believe that by improving the setup, testing procedures and applying our learnings from the first batch of prototype testing in subsequent testing that we can improve results even further
Based on the results from testing prototype 1 SmoRTech decided to progress to building an actual prototype to be used in a truly representative setting

Prototype (2022/23)

Following the highly promising results from the evaluation of the Proof-of-Concept vertical stack model constructed in 2021, SmoRTech drew up plans and designs for a smaller prototype of the SmogEater during 2022 and commenced construction in early 2023.
Construction of the housing framework (see below) for this prototype is now complete and assembly of the electronic components are currently underway.
The equipment (dimensions height – 900mm, width – 800mm, depth – 450mm) should be ready for testing in various real-world, indoor environments by mid-2023.

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