Removal of diethyl phthalate from water solution by adsorption, photo-oxidation, ozonation and advanced oxidation process (UV/H2O2, O3/H2O2 and O3/activated carbon) Article uri icon

abstract

  • The objective of this work was to compare the effectiveness of conventional technologies (adsorption on activated carbon, AC, and ozonation) and technologies based on advanced oxidation processes, AOPs, (UV/H2O2, O3/AC, O3/H2O2) to remove phthalates from aqueous solution (ultrapure water, surface water and wastewater). Diethyl phthalate (DEP) was chosen as a model pollutant because of its high water solubility (1080mg/L at 293K) and toxicity. The activated carbons showed a high adsorption capacity to adsorb DEP in aqueous solution (up to 858mg/g), besides the adsorption mechanism of DEP on activated carbon is governed by dispersive interactions between π electrons of its aromatic ring with π electrons of the carbon graphene planes. The photodegration process showed that the pH solution does not significantly affect the degradation kinetics of DEP and the first-order kinetic model satisfactorily fitted the experimental data. It was observed that the rate of decomposition of DEP with the O3/H2O2 and O3/AC systems is faster than that with only O3. The technologies based on AOPs (UV/H2O2, O3/H2O2, O3/AC) significantly improve the degradation of DEP compared to conventional technologies (O3, UV). AC adsorption, UV/H2O2, O3/H2O2, and O3/AC showed a high yield to remove DEP; however, the disadvantage of AC adsorption is its much longer time to reach maximum removal. The best system to treat water (ultrapure and natural) polluted with DEP is the O3/AC one since it achieved the highest DEP degradation and TOC removal, as well as the lower water toxicity. © 2012 Elsevier B.V.

publication date

  • 2013-01-01