Pharmaceutical wastewater treatment using granular activated carbon and UV/H₂O₂ processes: Experimental analysis and modelling

Abstract

The treatment of a synthetic pharmaceutical wastewater was studied using granular activated carbon (GAC) adsorption, UV/H2O2 process, and their combination. Experimental results reveal that GAC adsorption alone has 79% efficiency in total organic carbon (TOC) removal in 10 min breakthrough time with the dosage of 333.33 mg activated carbon/L. The adsorption data are fitted well with the Langmuir adsorption isotherm. The UV/H2O2 process alone at 6 h hydraulic retention time with optimum dosage of 4.25 mgH2O2/mgCOD shows 29 and 26% TOC reduction using 185 and 254 nm UV lamps, respectively. The kinetic modelling of the UV254/H2O2 process is developed using chemical oxygen demand (COD) and TOC as lumped parameters. A good agreement between model predictions and experimental data is confirmed. In combined processes, pre‐treated pharmaceutical wastewater by UV254/H2O2 followed by GAC adsorption process along with the desorption of contaminants from GAC and the subsequent treatment of the condensed steam by UV254/H2O2 process leads to 82 % TOC removal efficiency. On the other hand, the GAC adsorption along with UV254/H2O2 treatment of regenerant (condensed steam) from the desorption process leads to 88 % TOC removal at optimum conditions.

Integrated and Hybrid Processes for the Treatment of Actual Wastewaters Containing Micropollutants: A Review on Recent Advances

“…In AOPs, radicals are generated in different ways, including H 2 O 2 , O 3 , UV light, ultrasound irradiation, and catalysis, which produce products that are simpler in their chemical structure, and consequently biodegradable compounds like acetic acid and maleic acid [21,95]. The process efficiency depends on pH, the presence of background natural organic matter and radical scavengers in the water matrix, lamp technology, the concentration of oxidants, the reactivity of pollutants with an oxidizing agent, the initial concentration of pollutants, treatment time, the geometry of the reactor, and the type of catalyst [96,97]. AOPs can be categorized as Fenton-based, ozone-based, UV-based, and catalysis and include energy-assisted processes, as shown in Figure 1.…”

Development of a magnetic activated carbon adsorbent for the removal of common pharmaceuticals in wastewater treatment

“…Another possibility is the combination of desorption with degradation of the adsorbates by oxidation. In this particular, advanced oxidation processes (AOPs), based on the generation of the hydroxyl radical ( • OH), a very powerful oxidant (E° = 2.73 V) that reacts with organic compounds in a fast and nonselective way, present a potential alternative (Ghafoori et al 2014). Among these AOPs, Fenton's reagent (H 2 O 2 /Fe(II) under acidic conditions) seems particularly promising, especially because magnetite is an effective heterogeneous Fenton catalyst (Do et al 2011;Fischbacher et al 2017).…”

“…It is an effective and inexpensive solution for the removal of pharmaceutical, endocrine substances and imagology contrast agents. According to published work, activated carbon in its diverse forms has proven efficient in the removal of microorganisms and toxins (Upadhyayula et al 2009), natural organic matter (Wang et al 2010), pharmaceutical compounds (Ghafoori et al 2014) and metallic nanoparticles (Gicheva and Yordanov 2013).…”

Pharmaceutical removal from water with iron- or manganese-based technologies: A review

“…Powdered activated carbon (PAC) adsorption is a physico-chemical removal process for pharmaceuticals (Lima et al, 2014;Mailler et al, 2015) and other organic pollutants (Quinlivan et al, 2005;Ho et al, 2011;Ghafoori et al, 2014). Studies show that the addition of Fe species can improve the performance of PAC adsorption Park et al, 2015).…”