Recent advances in electrostatic precipitation of particles from flue gases generated by domestic heating appliances. A brief outlook

Winter season is the time of increased emission of exhaust gases from household heating appliances containing particulate matter (PM) and other noxious contaminants. Many old buildings and single houses, particularly at rural and small town regions, still use stoves, fireplaces or ovens to flat heating. Besides qualified fuels like coal or biomass pellets, all kinds of wastes are also burned in many cases, producing not only mineral particles but also toxic volatile organic compounds or other carcinogenic species. To solve the problem of high level of emission of solid particles and organic-compound molecules different constructions of electrostatic precipitators, which can remove such particles, have been developed in last two decades, which were designed to operate downstream of small domestic boilers. Such electrostatic precipitator must comply with the ECODESIGN emission limits, which set the emission level at 20 mg/m³, for biomass. The mass collection efficiency should be higher than 95 % to obtain this emission level. This brief review presents different constructions of electrostatic precipitators designed to be used for the removal of fly ash particles from domestic heating appliances.