Air purifiers with activated carbon offer an effective method for cleaning indoor air from a variety of volatile pollutants and unpleasant odors. The way such an air purifier with activated carbon works is based on a very simple principle that is nevertheless extremely effective. As a rule, activated carbon mats are installed in these air purifiers, through which the room air is sucked in using an electric fan.
The activated carbon used in these mats consists predominantly of carbon and is characterized by its extremely large inner surface. In fact, the internal surface area of the activated carbon can be up to 1,500 square meters with just one gram of material. This enormous surface area enables effective adsorption of volatile pollutants from the indoor air.
The micropores of activated carbon are particularly small, often less than 2 nanometers in size, which allows many pollutants to easily adhere to the surfaces of these micropores. This process is called adsorption. It should be noted that the thicker the layer of activated carbon, the greater its adsorption capacity. An additional advantage of activated carbon is that it partially acts as a reducing agent by releasing electrons and rendering certain chemicals such as ozone harmless.
Most air purifiers with activated carbon have a coarse pre-filter that is used to catch coarse particles such as animal hair, dust fluff and textile fibers. This prevents these coarse particles from quickly contaminating the activated carbon. In addition, many air purifiers with activated carbon also contain a HEPA filter, which is particularly suitable for filtering the finest, non-volatile particles from the air.
Overall, activated carbon air purifiers provide an effective solution for improving indoor air quality by removing a variety of volatile pollutants and unpleasant odors from indoor air.
