Anyone know anything about Noxer?

November 18, 2008 8:49 AM

I need information about Noxer, the pollution absorbing pavement, and fast!

Noxer is a relatively new type of paving material made from Titanium Dioxide that, when exposed to light, begins a reaction that attracts the things in car exhaust that one generally does not want in one's lungs, and basically neutralizes it into something harmless.

I've been working on a magazine article about Noxer, as well as other green paving technologies, for some time and while I've a wealth of secondary background material, the extent of my interviewing has been a short email with the PR rep for the company that developed it, Mitsubishi Materials. Reason being that most of what is happening with this technology is concentrated in Europe, specifically Spain and Italy, where the fact that I can only speak English severely limits me.

I am coming up against my deadline this coming Friday and so I am throwing out a desperate cry for help to the hive mind. I am looking for someone, anyone, who would be able to provide contact information for an English speaker who is connected with the pilot project in either Madrid or Milan, or are, themselves, connected to and knowledgeable about them. I need someone who can speak on the record. People can answer on this thread or through messaging me here.

Any help that can be sent my way would be much appreciated.

Thank you for your time.

posted by KantGoOn to science & nature (5 comments total)

http://www.ehponline.org/docs/2001/109-4/innovations.html
posted by arimathea at 9:54 AM on November 18, 2008

One this this material can't possibly do (at least on a macroscopic level) is attract pollutants. That would imply some sort of supernatural force. So please don't say that in your article.
posted by le morte de bea arthur at 10:46 AM on November 18, 2008

The principle of molecular diffusion isn't supernatural, le morte de bea authur.
posted by 517 at 1:37 PM on November 18, 2008

Molecular diffusion is not attraction, 517. It's a transport mechanism akin to convection. The word 'attracts' in this case isn't at all helpful in conveying the mechanism to a layperson.
posted by le morte de bea arthur at 1:56 PM on November 18, 2008

Well, given that these materials do beat up the noxious stuff that arrives by diffusion, thus reducing its partial pressure in the immediate vicinity of the material, the net effect on the noxious stuff is a one-way drift toward the reactive surface. It may not actually be attraction, but if all you're looking at is gross material flows, it will walk like it and quack like it.

I guess a rough analogy would be what happens when you open a window, on a still day, in a room where somebody has just farted. The fart smell will clear far more quickly than it would with the window closed, even though the window opening isn't specifically attracting the fart.
posted by flabdablet at 4:31 PM on November 18, 2008