Water disinfection by orifice-induced hydrodynamic cavitation

Hydrodynamic Cavitation (HC) is considered as a promising water-disinfection technique. Due to the enormous complexity of the physical and chemical processes at play, research on HC reactors is usually carried out following an empirical approach. Surprisingly, past experimental studies have never been designed on dimensional-analysis principles, which makes it difficult to identify the key processes controlling the problem, isolate their effects and scale up the results from laboratory to full-scale scenarios. The present paper overcomes this issue and applies the principles of dimensional analysis to identify the major non-dimensional parameters controlling disinfection efficacy in classical HC reactors, namely orifice plates. On the basis of this analysis, it presents results from a new set of experiments, which were designed to isolate mainly the effects of the so-called cavitation number (σ_v). Experimental data confirm that the disinfection efficacy of orifice plates increases with decreasing σ_v. Finally, in order to discuss the significance of the results presented herein and frame the scope of future research, the present paper provides an overview of the drawbacks associated with dimensional analysis within the context of HC.