HK1048798A - Method and apparatus for electrolytic disinfection of water - Google Patents

Description

Method and apparatus for electrolytic disinfection of water

Technical Field

The present invention relates to a water electrolysis disinfection method and an electrolysis disinfection apparatus for disinfecting raw material wash water for swimming pools and food processing, sterilized wash water for machines and containers, and drinking water on ships.

Background

In swimming pools, an aqueous solution of sodium hypochlorite is generally pumped to disinfect the water with chlorine. However, this method is difficult to control the concentration, and if it is added too little, the disinfecting effect is not significant, and it is liable to cause the propagation of microorganisms or algae, and if it is added excessively, it causes the harm of stimulating eyes, hair discoloration, etc. Particularly, in a warm water swimming pool, a room must be sealed for heat preservation in winter, and the water temperature is set high, so that chlorine dissolved in water is easily gasified to generate chlorine, and fills the room, which is not only harmful to human bodies, but also corrodes metal products. Moreover, infectious viruses such as herpes zoster cannot be killed by chlorine alone are present in swimming pools. In addition, in the drinking water storage tank on the ship, chlorine is continuously gasified due to long-time navigation, and the drinking water storage tank is in an unsterilized state, so that the health of crews and passengers is adversely affected.

The results of studies on water disinfection or sterilization conducted by the present inventors have shown that the amount of hypochlorite used can be reduced as compared with the case where hypochlorite is used alone by dissolving hypochlorite and silver ions, or hypochlorite, silver ions and copper ions, and that not only can a lower chlorine concentration be ensured in water, but also a powerful disinfecting or sterilizing effect can be exerted greatly. That is, the water containing dissolved hypochlorite and silver ions or hypochlorite, silver ions and copper ions can bind to enzymes in the cells of lower organisms such as microorganisms and algae in the water, effectively blocking the physiological process of converting nutrients into energy, and can coagulate proteins, destroy the cells of the lower organisms, and exert a powerful bactericidal or disinfectant effect. In addition, the composition can also play a role in inhibiting propagation of infectious bacteria.

Accordingly, an object of the present invention is to provide an electrolytic disinfection method and an electrolytic disinfection apparatus for water which can disinfect raw material washing water in swimming pools and food manufacturing, sterilized washing water of machines and containers, drinking water on ships, and the like, reliably, safely, and in a short time, while avoiding the disadvantages of the conventional disinfection methods, by using water in which hypochlorite and silver ions, or hypochlorite, silver ions, and copper ions are dissolved.

Summary of The Invention

In order to achieve the above object, the electrolytic sterilization method of the present invention is to sterilize water after dissolving hypochlorite and silver ions.

The water containing dissolved hypochlorite and silver ions can not only reduce the amount of hypochlorite used, i.e., ensure a low chlorine concentration in water to be disinfected, but also rapidly exert a powerful disinfecting or disinfecting action. Therefore, for example, when the water is mixed into water in a swimming pool or the like, the growth of microorganisms or algae can be prevented reliably and safely, and the metal product is not corroded. In addition, the disinfectant can be added to raw material washing water in a food processing process, sterilized washing water for machines, containers, and the like, drinking water on ships, and the like, and the disinfected water can be disinfected reliably, safely, and in a short time.

The water is preferably disinfected by dissolving hypochlorite and silver and copper ions. Thus, water to be disinfected can be disinfected more effectively, and the effect of preventing the propagation of infectious bacteria can be effectively exerted.

The electrolytic disinfection apparatus of the present invention comprises a 1 st electrolytic apparatus for generating silver ions and a 2 nd electrolytic apparatus for generating hypochlorite, wherein the 1 st electrolytic apparatus comprises at least 1 set of 2 blocks and 1 set of electrodes for generating silver ions by energization, and the 2 nd electrolytic apparatus comprises at least 1 set of 2 blocks and 1 set of electrodes for generating hypochlorite by energization.

The above electrolytic apparatus is a simple device connected to a water circulation line such as a swimming pool or a ship drinking water storage tank, and can sterilize such water reliably, safely, and quickly. Since a swimming pool or the like generally uses tap water sterilized with sodium hypochlorite or the like and contains salts of electrolyte components, electrodes of the 2 nd electrolysis apparatus are electrified and electrolyzed to form Cl at the anode₂At the cathode, NaOH is formed, and these reactions can be regenerated to sodium hypochlorite NaClO, which is dissolved in the water to be disinfected. In addition, in the 1 st electrolyzer, the electrodes are electrified for electrolysis, and the anode is provided with silver ions Ag⁺Dissolved in the sterilized water. Use of such a solution of NaClO and Ag⁺The water of (2) may be water to be sterilized.

The 1 st electrolytic device preferably includes at least 1 group of electrodes for generating 1 group and 2 blocks of silver ions and copper ions by applying electricity. The electrodes of the device are electrified to electrolyze, and silver ions Ag are dissolved out from the anode⁺And copper ion Cu²⁺And dissolved in the sterilized water. Then, the Ag dissolved with two ions⁺、Cu²⁺And NaClO, can sterilize the water to be sterilized more effectively.

Further, it is preferable that the electrodes of the 1 st and 2 nd electrolyzing devices are accommodated in a single case in parallel. Thus, the entire disinfection electrolyzer can be miniaturized and can be easily installed in a swimming pool or a ship drinking water storage tank.

Brief description of the drawings

FIG. 1 is an oblique axis side projection view of an embodiment of the electrolytic sterilizing device of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a longitudinal sectional view of the 1 st and 2 nd electrolyzing apparatuses used in the apparatus.

FIG. 3 is a perspective view of the electrode assembly inside the device, taken along the oblique axis.

Figure 4 is an oblique axis side projection view showing another embodiment of an electrode assembly.

FIG. 5 is a control block diagram for controlling the energization of the electrode assembly.

Best mode for carrying out the invention

Hereinafter, one embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.

Fig. 1 shows a substantially entire structure of the electrolytic sterilizing device of the present invention. The electrolytic sterilizing apparatus comprises a 1 st electrolytic device 1 for generating silver ions and a 2 nd electrolytic device 2 for generating sodium hypochlorite as an example of hypochlorite, both of which are connected in series by a communication pipe 10, and an inlet pipe 11 attached to an inlet end of the 1 st electrolytic device 1 and an outlet pipe 21 attached to the 2 nd electrolytic device 2 are connected to a water supply and drainage pipeline of a swimming pool or the like, not shown. Then, water in the water supply and drainage line, which is disinfected with sodium hypochlorite or the like and contains salts of electrolyte components, is passed through the 1 st and 2 nd electrolyzing apparatuses 1 and 2 to be electrolyzed to produce silver ions and sodium hypochlorite, and the silver ions and the sodium hypochlorite are dissolved in the water, and the water can disinfect water to be disinfected in a swimming pool or the like. The 1 st and 2 nd electrolyzing devices 1 and 2 are connected to a control box 3 by a lead 30, and the electrodes in the electrolyzing devices 1 and 2 are controlled by a controller mounted on the control box 3. The 1 st and 2 nd electrolyzing devices 1 and 2 may be installed at any position in front of and behind the water flow direction.

The 1 st and 2 nd electrolyzing apparatuses 1 and 2 are described with the same drawings since they have almost the same structures. The two types of apparatuses 1 and 2 are different in the material of the electrodes disposed therein, and the 2 nd electrolytic apparatus 2 is different from the 1 st electrolytic apparatus 1 only in that a gas discharge pipe 22 for discharging hydrogen gas is attached, because sodium hypochlorite is generated and hydrogen gas is generated at the same time when electrolysis is performed. As shown in fig. 2, in both devices 1 and 2, a rectifier 5 is attached to the front end in the water flow direction inside a case 4 having both long-side ends sealed with covers 41 and 42, and an electrode assembly 6 is provided behind the rectifier. One end of each of the covers 41 and 42 is connected to the inflow pipe 11 or the communication pipe 10, and the other end is connected to the communication pipe 10 or the outflow pipe 21.

Fig. 3 shows an example of an electrode assembly 6 used in both devices 1 and 2, in the embodiment of the figure, 2 electrodes 61 and 62 facing each other are 1 set, and both ends of the long sides of the electrodes are fixed by using space holding members 7 and 7 in order to secure almost the same space between the electrodes of 4 sets. Further, the electrodes 61 and 62 are provided with connectors 60 at upper and lower ends of the long sides thereof, and are connected to the lead wires 30 drawn out from the control box 3. In this case, silver or an alloy of silver and copper is used for the electrodes 61 and 62 of the 2 blocks 1 set in the 1 st electrolysis apparatus 1, and the electrodes made of these materials are immersed in water containing salt of an electrolyte component, which is sterilized with sodium hypochlorite or the like, and are electrolyzed by applying current to the respective electrodes to generate silver ions or copper ions. For example, when a silver material and a silver-copper alloy material or a silver-copper alloy material are used as two electrodes (counter electrodes) and dc electrolysis is performed while phase inversion is performed, silver ions and copper ions are generated, and when dc electrolysis is performed with a silver material as two electrodes, only silver ions are generated. On the other hand, the electrodes 61 and 62 of the 2 blocks 1 set in the 2 nd electrolysis apparatus 2 are made of titanium material and platinum layer formed on one or both surfaces of the titanium material, and are subjected to direct current electrolysis while inverting the phase thereof to generate sodium hypochlorite by using these electrodes as two electrodes.

It is important that the electrode assembly 6 is composed of 2 or 1 sets of electrodes, even number of which is used, and when the electrode assembly is composed of odd number of electrodes, the dc electrolysis is performed while the phase is reversed, and the electrodes are not supplied with the same amount of current during the reversal, so that the electrolysis hardly occurs. For example, in the case of performing electrolysis by using 7 electrodes in total, 4 of them and the other 3 of them to which positive charges and negative charges are alternately applied, the amount of current is extremely low when the phase is reversed, resulting in failure of electrolysis.

In the embodiment of FIG. 4, the electrode assemblies 6 used in the 1 st and 2 nd electrolyzing apparatuses 1 and 2 are arranged in parallel in the width direction perpendicular to the longitudinal direction of the electrodes with the center in the width direction being partitioned by the partition plate 63, and both the long-side ends are fixed by the partition members 7 and 7 so that the electrodes 61 and 61 of the electrode assemblies 6 are kept at almost the same interval. Then, the electrode assemblies 6 held in this manner are arranged in one case 4, and the entire disinfection electrolyzer is downsized and can be mounted in a drinking water tank or the like of a swimming pool or a ship.

FIG. 5 shows a control block diagram for controlling the energization of the electrode assembly 6, in which the output terminal of the controller 31 installed in the control box 3 is connected to the power supply unit 32, the power supply unit 32 is connected to the phase inverter 33 controlled by a time relay or the like installed in the controller 31, and the output terminal of the phase inverter 33 is connected to the electrodes 61 and 62 of the electrode assembly 6 installed in the 1 st electrolysis unit 1 and the electrodes 61 and 62 of the electrode assembly 6 installed in the 2 nd electrolysis unit 2, respectively. In addition, a detector 34 capable of detecting whether or not water to be sterilized is necessary is connected to an input terminal of the controller 31. The detector 34 can detect the dissolution of sodium hypochlorite or silver ions and copper ions in water, for example, by using a pH meter or a conductivity meter.

Next, the operation of the electrolytic sterilizing apparatus configured as described above will be described. First, when the detector 34 measures the amount of sodium hypochlorite, silver ions, and copper ions dissolved in water, which is not more than a certain range, and it is necessary to disinfect water to be disinfected, the power supply 32 supplies current to the electrodes 61 and 62 of the electrode assembly 6 installed in the 1 st and 2 nd electrolyzing apparatuses 1 and 2 via the phase inverter 33 in accordance with the output of the controller 31.

When the current is applied, the phase inverter 33 applies positive and negative charges alternately to the electrodes 61 and 62 by phase inversion, so that silver ions and copper ions or silver ions are generated at the electrodes in the 1 st electrolysis apparatus 1 and dissolved in water. In addition, sodium hypochlorite is generated at the electrode in the 2 nd electrolysis apparatus 2 and dissolved in water. Then, the water to be sterilized is sterilized by water in which sodium hypochlorite and silver ions or copper ions are dissolved.

The amount of sodium hypochlorite dissolved in water to be sterilized is preferably 0.01 to 0.04ppm, particularly about 0.015 to 0.03 ppm. The amount of silver ions dissolved in water to be disinfected is preferably 0.03 to 0.08ppm, and the amount of copper ions dissolved in water is preferably 0.1 to 0.5 ppm. Particularly, silver ion is 0.04 to 0.06ppm, and copper ion is preferably 0.2 to 0.4ppm, and concentrations in this range are approximately in the range, so that a strong bactericidal and disinfectant action can be rapidly exerted, the propagation of microorganisms or algae can be surely and safely prevented, and an excellent effect of inhibiting the propagation of infectious bacteria can be exerted.

Aiming at the disinfection effect of only sodium hypochlorite NaClO and the dissolved sodium hypochlorite NaClO and silver ion Ag⁺The results of comparative experiments carried out on the disinfection effect of (a) are described below.

Experiment 1

Samples of solutions containing NaClO (0.02ppm) alone and NaClO and Ag dissolved therein were prepared in water to be sterilized, which had different chlorine concentrations (0.1, 0.15, 0.2, 0.35, 0.5ppm)⁺(0.06ppm) and 80000 E.coli/ml of these solution samples were contacted for 1 minute, and then the remaining E.coli was examined. The results are shown in Table 1.

As can be seen from Table 1, NaClO and Ag were dissolved⁺Compared with the solution sample with NaClO added alone, the solution sample of (2) has greatly improved bactericidal effect, reduces the chlorine concentration, namely reduces the using amount of NaClO, and can kill large intestine stemsAnd (5) bacteria. That is, when only NaClO is used and the chlorine concentration is about 0.1 to 0.2ppm, 10000 Escherichia coli cells remain, and NaClO and Ag are dissolved in the cells⁺The solution (2) can reduce the residual number of Escherichia coli to about 600 at a chlorine concentration of about 0.1ppm, and most of Escherichia coli can be killed.

Experiment 2

A sample solution prepared by adding NaClO (0.02ppm) alone to water to be sterilized having a constant chlorine concentration (0.05ppm) and a solution prepared by dissolving NaClO and Ag⁺(0.06ppm) of a solution sample, and these solution samples were contacted with 80000 E.coli cells for various times (5, 15, 35, 60, 85, 120 seconds), and then the remaining E.coli cells were examined. The results are shown in Table 2.

As is clear from Table 2, NaClO and Ag were dissolved⁺The solution sample of (2) can rapidly exhibit a strong bactericidal effect and kill Escherichia coli in a short time as compared with a solution sample containing only NaClO. That is, in the case of using only NaClO, Escherichia coli remained after the contact time was 85 seconds, and NaClO and Ag were dissolved⁺In about 15 seconds, almost all of the E.coli was killed.

The above embodiment has been described with sodium hypochlorite as an example of hypochlorite, and other hypochlorites such as calcium hypochlorite may be used. In addition, when water in which hypochlorite has not been dissolved in advance is disinfected, hypochlorite is added to the water, and the water is introduced into the 1 st and 2 nd electrolyzing apparatuses 1 and 2.

As described above, the present invention can sterilize a swimming pool, raw material washing water in a food processing process, sterilized washing water for machines or containers, drinking water for ships, and the like, with hypochlorite and silver ions or hypochlorite, silver ions, and copper ions dissolved in water, without causing problems encountered in the past, in a sure, safe, and short time.

TABLE 1

Chlorine concentration (ppm)	Using only NaClO	NaClO + silver ion
			0.1	10000	600
0.15	10000	600
			0.2	10000	600
0.35	500	0
			0.5	0	0

TABLE 2

Contact time (seconds)	Using only NaClO	NaClO + silver ion
			5	8000	4500
15	1800	0
			35	700	0
60	50	0
			85	50	0
120	0	0

Claims (5)

1. An electrolytic disinfection method for disinfecting water by dissolving hypochlorite and silver ions.

2. An electrolytic disinfection method as claimed in claim 1 for disinfecting water by dissolving hypochlorite and silver ions and copper ions.

3. An apparatus for the electrolytic disinfection of water, comprising a 1 st electrolysis unit for generating silver ions and a 2 nd electrolysis unit for generating hypochlorite, the 1 st electrolysis unit having at least 1 set of electrodes of 2 blocks and 1 set and being energized to generate silver ions, the 2 nd electrolysis unit having at least 1 set of electrodes of 2 blocks and 1 set and being energized to generate hypochlorite.

4. An apparatus for the electrolytic disinfection of water as claimed in claim 3, said 1 st electrolysis apparatus having at least 1 set 2 blocks 1 set of electrodes energized to produce silver and copper ions.

5. An apparatus for the electrolytic disinfection of water as claimed in claim 3 or 4, wherein said electrodes of said 1 st and 2 nd electrolyzing devices are accommodated in 1 case in parallel.