Interactions between volatile air pollutants and atmospheric water production – effects of chemical properties, mechanisms, and transfer processes

Regional water scarcity is among the most urgent challenges of global climate change. Atmospheric water harvesting is a promising method to mitigate these challenges, and the atmospheric water generator (AWG) is already an established technology. Although this method can produce over 10,000 L of water per day, the water's quality has not been studied in depth. Air pollutants, especially volatile organic compounds (VOCs), are potential contaminants of water produced from air. We evaluated the chemical and physical parameters of different VOCs that might influence their ability to be transferred from air to AWG water. Our findings strongly suggest that the ability to form hydrogen bonds is a key factor in this transfer. Henry's law constant, polarity, and intrinsic solubility were the main predictors of a VOC's transfer to AWG water. Hence, aliphatic or aromatic compounds (such as benzene or octane) were not found at significant concentrations in AWG water (e.g. above WHO guidelines), whereas ammonia and alcohol compounds were. This should be taken into consideration when analyzing potential contaminants in harvested atmospheric water. The condensation process itself was also found to enhance the transfer of VOCs into water droplets, and higher relative humidity (%RH) also increased VOC transfer. Gas-phase infrared spectrum analysis of VOCs at different %RH revealed possible interactions between water vapor and specific VOCs in the air. However, our main conclusion from this study is that VOC transfer from the air into AWG water occurs predominantly via dissolution in the condensed droplets, and strongly depends on their chemical properties of polarity and hydrogen-bond formation.