Unique Air Purification Technology

How Negative Ions and Ozone Clean the Air

"Electronically emitting nature's most powerful air-cleansing agents over a large area."

Why negative ions and low-level ozone?

Negative ions and ozone are nature's most powerful air-cleansing agents. There is nothing in the world more effective in taking allergens and contaminates out of the air we breathe. Unfortunately, due to the tight construction of today's homes and buildings, they are unable to take effect within indoor environments.

Negative ions and ozone are created by nature, and found at their most optimal levels where the air is most pure and healthy. These places typically include up in the mountains, near waterfalls, where lightning has just occured, in open meadows away from "the city", and the ocean shore by the crashing waves.

Negative Ion Facts

• Approved by the U.S. FDA (Food & Drug Admin.) as an approved allergy treatment.
• Ionization is mandatory in many European and Russian Hospitals.
• In March of 1999, Good Housekeeping Magazine had its engineers test an ionizer by using a smoke test, and found that it cleared out the smoke in a tank.
• A recent study by the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture found that ionizing a room led to 52% less dust in the air, and 95% less bacteria in the air (since many of the pollutants found in the air reside on floating dust particles).

It really works well. I can even have an occasional cigar and the odor is completely gone the next morning. - M. Demcho, Ohio

What are negative ions?

Negative ions are electrically-charged particles in the air that remove airborne contaminates from the air we breathe, and have a rejuvinating effect when interacting with physiological systems (such as the respiratory system).

(See summaries of scientific studies illustrating the effect of negative ions.)

Have you ever noticed that how refreshing the air is when you are in the mountains, or by a waterfall? Or how revitalized you feel?

The explanation for this is that there are usually at least 2,000 negative ions per cubic centimeter (which is optimal) in these environments. On the other hand, there are only a couple hundred negative ions per cubic cm. in the typical indoor environment.

The reason indoor environments lack the electrical "nutrients of the air" that we need is that today's "air-tight" homes and buildings prevent them from treating the air inside.

Plus, most homes and buildings are in urban settings and other places where the earth is covered by mostly concrete and asphalt. Large amounts of concrete and asphalt, and other structures fabricated by man tend to disrupt the air's electrical balance in areas where they reside.

Negative Ion and Ozone Air Purifier Products

How do negative ions remove pollutants from the air?

      
Negatively-charged negative ions attach themselves to contaminates and allergens, which are positively-charged. The newly-formed larger particles are then able to fall to the ground, and out of the air we breathe.

Most floating contaminates and allergens are positively charged, and of course, negative ions are negatively charged. In environments where high densities of negative ions exist, they are able to reverse the charge of floating contaminates to a negative charge.

This results in a magnetic attraction among the floating pollutants in the air, causing them to aggregate, or clump together.

As a result, they become too heavy to remain floating in the air, and fall harmlessly to the ground, where they cannot find their way into your respiratory tract.

At this point, even if they are inhaled before falling out of the air, these now larger particles are able to be intercepted by the "filters" of the upper respiratory tract, due to their increased size.

Of course, without a continual generation of negative ions, some of these enlargened pollutants can find their way back into the air. IPS air purification systems are designed for continual use, ensuring pollutants stay out of the air you breathe.

Some studies suggest that negative ions also have a biological effect on bacteria and viruses, killing them on contact in many cases.

Summaries of scientific studies involving negative ions.

Negative Ion and Ozone Air Purifier Products

How does ozone work?

Ozone oxidizes airborne pollutants, then reverts to oxygen,
leaving behind cleansed and refreshened air.
Here's how this process works:

Oxygen Molecules

Ozone Molecules converted from oxygen (right) as a result of an electrical charge, such as that provided by lightning, or an IPS air purifier.

One oxygen atom splits off to oxidize pollutant, leaving behind breathable oxygen and purified air.

Ozone is highly reactive, so it interacts with most contaminates and allergens it encounters. As the element with the second highest oxidation potential (next to flourine), ozone proceeds to destroy the pollutant through oxidation.

Negative Ion and Ozone Air Purifier Products

Effectiveness of Ozone

Typical Applications of Ozone include:

• Purification of drinking water
• Hospital labs and operating rooms
• Morgues
• Cafeterias
• HVAC systems
• Deodorization of air in inhabited places
• Food and plant preservation
• Treatment of industrial liquid waste

Is Ozone Safe?

Although some groups claim that ozone is harmful, proof of its safetiness and usefulness at moderate concentrations have prevailed in hearings before the FTC. Plus, millions of ozone air purifiers have been sold in the United States over the years, but there are no specific cases where an ozone air cleaner has been linked to any kind of harm or injury.

Why ozone is mistakenly given a bad name.

Ozone can only be harmful only when occurring at extremely high concentration. However, at lower levels it serves as a powerful purification element without harmful side effect. It's also a powerful purification agent in large doses, but can also act as a lung irritant in higher concentrations.

One example of this is an ozone alert, which is a warning to the public when outdoor levels of ozone reach a high level. Ozone alerts usually occur in already polluted areas where there is a high conctration of hydrocarbons in the air (pollutants that result from smokestack and vehicle exhaust pollution).

Why ozone is associated with smog.

In these cases though, the reason ozone concentration hits high levels in polluted areas is due to the fact that they are a byproduct of the sun rays coming in contact with hydrocarbons. This is the sun's way of trying to
neutralize the pollutants. In which case, where the hydrocarbon level is very high, the ozone concentration also becomes higher.

However, it is much easier to measure ozone concentrations than it is hydrocarbon concentrations, so ozone gets the bad name, even though it is the hydrocarbons that are the real problem. Most ozone air purification systems (including the Surround Air, Spring Air, and Biozone models) are designed to produce ozone in levels of less than 0.04 parts per million (OSHA recommends less than 0.1 ppm, while the FDA recommends .05 ppm, see chart below).

But as is the case with just about every other chemical element, ozone has its range of effects, from no effect, to useful effect, to hazardous effects.

Another good example of this is table salt, which provides essential fortification for nerve cells and the kidneys, and prevents heat stress disorders at lower concentrations. At higher levels though, salt can result in hypertension and cardiac failure.

Effectiveness of Ozone

Negative Ion and Ozone Air Purifier Products

Some Ozone Generators Create Oxides of Nitrogen.
(IPS Air Purifiers Do Not Create Oxides of Nitrogen.)

You should beware of other well-known ozone generators that create oxides of nitrogen as a byproduct of creating ozone. These oxides of nitrogen are characterized by a highly unpleasant "metallic" odor, which can also act as an irritant to the respiratory tract. Unlike these other air purifiers, IPS models do not use a glass plate to create ozone, allowing them to avoid the product of oxides of nitrogen.

Negative Ion and Ozone Air Purification Products