Electrochemical degradation of carbamazepine in aqueous solutions - optimization of kinetic aspects by design of experiments

Abstract

Electrodegradation of simulated pharmaceutical wastewaters was performed and optimized according to response surface methodology. To this end, carbamazepine (CBZ) was used as a model compound and a design of experiments was planned for evaluating the influence of two main variables in the electrochemical process: initial CBZ concentration (in logarithm terms) and the current density. Target variable was an apparent first-order kinetic constant (k) designed ad hoc. Interaction of variables was confirmed and an optimum k constant of 0.72min-1 was obtained. CBZ was also removed from real wastewater matrices, such as urban wastewater or surface water from river and lake.