Research Article Open Access

TREATABILITY STUDY OF PHARMACEUTICAL WASTE WATER BY COMBINED SOLAR PHOTO FENTON AND ACTIVATED SLUDGE PROCESS

Abstract

In the present study, the treatability of wastewater from a pharmaceutical industry by combined solar photoFenton oxidation and activated sludge process was investigated. The wastewater was considered non-biodegradable as it contained significant amount of organic compounds whose degradation was not possible by conventional biological treatment system. The characteristics of the wastewater have shown to contain high COD (25600 mg/L) and BOD3 (4890 mg/L) and the biodegradability of wastewater measured, as BOD3/COD ratio was 0.19. In order to enhance the biodegradability of the pharmaceutical wastewater, photoassisted oxidation process, H2O2/ Fe2+/ Solar was applied to the wastewater as a pretreatment step to biological degradation. The influence of the reaction parameters such as pH, dosage of HaC^ and Fe(II) and BOD3/ COD as a function of the time of photochemical pretreatment were studied. A COD removal of 88% was observed in onehour photochemical treatment time at pH 3 and at the dosage of H2O2 (65 mL) and Fe2+ (1.34 g). The biodegradability of wastewater has enhanced from 0.19 to 0.4 (measured as BOD3/ COD ratio) after 40 min photochemical treatment time. The combined solar photoFenton oxidation and biodegradation of wastewater has resulted in BOD removal of 93 % and COD removal of 95 %.

Bhaskaran Varatharajan and S. Kanmani

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