Decolorization of industrial wastewater using electrochemical peroxidation process

Abstract

In this study, decolorization of wastewater samples taken from the paper industry is investi-gated using an electrochemical peroxidation process. The electrochemical peroxidation process is a part of electrochemical advanced oxidation processes, which is based on the Fenton’s chemical reaction, provided by the addition of external H2O2 into the reaction cell. In this study, iron is used as anode and graphite as cathode placed at the fixed distance of 30 mm in a glass reaction cell. The cell was filled with the solution containing wastewater and sodium chloride as the supporting electrolyte. Factors of the process such as pH, current intensity, hydrogen peroxide concentration, and time of treatment were studied. The results illustrate that all these parameters affect efficiencies of dye removal and chemical oxygen demand (COD) reduction. The maximal removal of wastewater contaminants was achieved under acid (pH 3) condition, with the applied current of 1 A and hydrogen peroxide concentration of 0.033 M. At these conditions, decolorization process efficiency reached 100 and 83 % of COD removal after 40 minutes of wastewater sample treatment. In addition, the electrical energy consumption for wastewater treatment by electrochemical peroxidation was calculated, showing an increase as the current intensity of the treatment process was increased. The obtained results suggest that the electrochemical peroxidation process can remove dye compounds and chemical oxygen demand (COD) from industrial wastewaters with high removal efficiency.