‘Inno+ Air inside: Combining animal welfare and economically responsible business management.’

The Grefte family, owners of SunBro

The air scrubber system explained

An air scrubber system is the ideal solution to reducing harmful emissions. Intensive livestock farming is legally obliged to descrease the emission of ammonia, odour and particulate matter in order to reduce the impact on the environment. Therefore, Inno+ has developed a system to tackle this.

Working of the air scrubber system

The air scrubbers work rather simple, though effective:

The ventilation air comes in contact with water.
The washing water is continuously pumped around, together with the ventilation air.
This washing water absorbs dust, odour and ammonia particles.
The outgoing air cleaned thoroughly.

For maximum removal of dust, odour and ammonia, it is necessary to continuously control the wash water quality. The two most important parameters that are controlled and regulated are the pH and the conductivity of the wash water. A constantly regulated pH is necessary to achieve optimum removal of ammonia and odour molecules. The conductivity control is necessary to control the desired maximum nitrogen content in the drain water.

Watch the video below to get a better understanding of how our air scrubber system works.

Different types of commercial air scrubber systems

Inno+ has three different types of advanced air scrubbers available:

Biological systems : these use micro-organisms in the wash water to reduce ammonia and odour from the stables. This leads to a minimum of 85% ammonia reduction, 45% odour reduction and 80 % fine dust reduction. Download the whitepaper of our Biological-airscrubber.
Chemical systems : they reduce ammonia and odour by adding sulphuric acid to the wash water, whereby the pH drops, and ammonia is taken up in the water . This leads to an ammonia reduction of 70 to 95%, an odour reduction of 30% to 40% and a particulate matter reduction of 35%. Download the whitepaper of our Chemical-air-scrubber.
Combi washers: these systems consist of at least two washing steps. A combi system can include both a biological or chemical system combined with a water washer and or biological filter. This leads to an ammonia reduction of 70 to 85%, an odour reduction of 30 to 75% and an average fine dust reduction of 80%.

Systems for manure treatment

Next to our systems for use in pig or poultry stables, we also have air washers used for manure treatment. These prefabricated chemical air scrubbers are designed to be used after the Big Dutchman CompoLiner manure treatment system.

When connected to the CompoLiner, the air eventually enters the scrubber part from the bottom. After being intensely rinsed in the horizontal washing bed, the process water is dosed with acid and recirculated until it reaches a certain pollution level. At the end, clean water is added to the process water of the air scrubber.

All the measurements, valves and controls are fully automated for easy operation. The wastewater can be used as a liquid fertilizer as it contains ammonium sulphate. Download our the whitepaper for more details on the CompoLiner-Airscrubber.

Combining airscrubbers with heat recovery

Energy that is lost during the washing process can be recovered and reintroduced into the production process to provide the animals with an optimal climate environment. This means the animals experience more well-being and better health.

We combined the best airscrubbers with heat recovery for ‘Kuijpers Kip’, a poultry house located in The Netherlands. Watch the video below for more details.

A suitable solution for a pig farmer in France

Together with Big Dutchman, a biological air scrubber was provided to David Grone, a pig farmer located in Prat, in the region of central Brittany, France. The plan was to build a new building suitable for 3000 piglets. Big Dutchman was asked to provide the building with a complete farm ventilation system.

During the first phase of the project, air washers weren’t included in the building and local authorities weren’t pleased about this, because of the harmful emissions and smells that would hinder the environment and local neighbours. The Porcus air scrubber system was chosen to counter these negative effects. The system used for this project was made and tested at the Inno+ factory in the Netherlands and then shipped as a single unit for installation.

Pig Farmer David Grone was very pleased with the result, and stated: We are very pleased with our decision to invest in this type of system and would recommend it to anyone needing to install air scrubbing

Learn more about this project.

What are the advantages?

The systems of Inno+ have several advantages that might be interesting for you.

Our airscrubbers have a large filter surface. This means a low air resistance and the energy consumption of the fans is considerably less.
A unique pump technology for the wash water guarantees continuous watering of the package in the air scrubber, so that they are continuously rinsed clean. This pump technology, combined with unique pre-filters, also guarantees lower energy costs, because the hydraulic dimensions of the pipes and nozzles mean less water resistance.

The advanced air scrubbers are easy to maintain and control.

Two sensors that measure the pH value make it is possible to control the supply of sulphuric acid and the activity of bacteria. Furthermore, a conductivity sensor measures the nitrogen concentration in the process water. Both are indicators of water quality and crucial for optimum performance.
For the necessary maintenance all components are easy to reach and to clean. There are also data management systems , both locally and via the Internet, with which the user can monitor the washing process . This makes it possible to intervene quickly if necessary.

A new type of air scrubber system

Reducing harmful emissions is still an important topic for livestock farmers. Because of this, we are continuously looking for the best suitable solution to tackle this problem. In the past 15 years, we have realized numerous projects for reducing harmful emissions in livestock houses, and with great success. However, the experience we obtained during these 15 years, as well as collaborating with several pig farmers, we have successfully developed two brand new air scrubber systems.

These new systems are biological and chemical air scrubbers that reduce harmful emissions more effective than ever before. For example, our new chemical system can reduce ammonia by 90%.

Data registration of our airscrubbers

The real-time data recording system can be continuously monitored from a central location by our technical team to ensure the optimum performance that was agreed upon. This allows our customers to respond to changes in their business and to repair any problems that arise, so that they can achieve their emission reduction targets continuously.

Are you interested in our air scrubber systems and would you like to receive more information on our other smart farming solutions? Please contact us here. We are happy to help you.