title: Mechanochemical destruction of halogenated organic pollutants: A critical review.
abstract: Many tons of intentionally produced obsolete halogenated persistent organic pollutants (POPs), are stored worldwide in stockpiles, often in an unsafe manner. These are a serious threat to the environment and to human health due to their ability to migrate and accumulate in the biosphere. New technologies, alternatives to combustion, are required to destroy these substances, hopefully to their complete mineralization. In the last 20 years mechanochemical destruction has shown potential to achieve pollutant degradation, both of the pure substances and in contaminated soils. This capability has been tested for many halogenated pollutants, with various reagents, and under different milling conditions. In the present paper, a review of the published work in this field is followed by a critique of the state of the art of POPs mechanochemical destruction and its applicability to full-scale halogenated waste treatment.
authors.affiliation: State Key Joint Laboratory of Environment Simulation and Pollution Control (SKJLESPC), Beijing Key Laboratory of Emerging Organic Contaminants Control (BKLEOCC), School of Environment, POPs Research Center, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, PR China.
authors.forename: Giovanni
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Cagnetta
authors.affiliation: School of Applied Sciences, AUT University, Auckland 1010, New Zealand.
authors.forename: John
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Robertson
authors.affiliation: State Key Joint Laboratory of Environment Simulation and Pollution Control (SKJLESPC), Beijing Key Laboratory of Emerging Organic Contaminants Control (BKLEOCC), School of Environment, POPs Research Center, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, PR China. Electronic address: huangjun@tsinghua.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Jun
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Huang
authors.affiliation: State Key Joint Laboratory of Environment Simulation and Pollution Control (SKJLESPC), Beijing Key Laboratory of Emerging Organic Contaminants Control (BKLEOCC), School of Environment, POPs Research Center, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, PR China.
authors.forename: Kunlun
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: State Key Joint Laboratory of Environment Simulation and Pollution Control (SKJLESPC), Beijing Key Laboratory of Emerging Organic Contaminants Control (BKLEOCC), School of Environment, POPs Research Center, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, PR China.
authors.forename: Gang
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Yu
keywords: Halogenated persistent organic pollutants (POPs); High energy milling; Mechanochemistry; Non-thermal destruction