Activated carbon, hazards with

Activated carbon generally presents no particular health hazard as defined by NIOSH (62). However, it is a nuisance and mild irritant with respect to inhalation, skin contact, eye exposure, and ingestion. On the other hand, special consideration must be given to the handling of spent carbon that may contain a concentration of toxic compounds. 

Reducing the intrinsic hazard of chemicals is the most effective and most fundamental of the risk reduction options available. Intrinsic risk reduction is based on the principle that the structure of a chemical drives hazard and molecular intentional, informed manipulation will result in the design of safer chemicals. Wastewater treatment plants employ large filters packed with granular activated carbon to remove polluted water. Synthetic chemists are... 

Brunotts, V.A., Cost-effective treatment of priority pollutant compounds with granular activated carbon, National Conference on Management of Uncontrolled Hazardous Waste Sites, Washington, 1983. 

Sirianuntapiboon S, Sansak J (2008) Treatability studies with granular activated carbon (GAC) and sequencing batch reactor (SBR) system for textile wastewater containing direct dyes. J Hazard Mater 159 404-411... 

Activated carbon adsorption is mainly a waste concentration method. The exhausted carbon must be regenerated or disposed of as hazardous waste. For GAC consumptions larger than 2000 Ib/day, onsite regeneration may be economically justified [7]. Thermal regeneration is the most common method for GAC reactivation, although other methods such as washing the exhausted GAC with acid, alkaline, solvent, or steam are sometimes practiced for specific applications [17]. 

One of the activated carbons applications is purification of air and removal of odoriferous substances, hazardous to human health, from the atmosphere. Acetaldehyde can be considered as such a compound. Adsorption of formaldehyde on activated carbons was studied by Domingo-Garcia et al. [10]. They found that it is strongly adsorbed and the retention volumes obtained in that study increased with an increase in the surface areas of activated carbons. 

---