Comparative study on the solarphotocatalytic degradation of Benzene substituted organic compounds

Abstract

One of the major problems in the industrial wastewater treatment plant is the presence toxic organic compounds in wastewater. The wastewater constituent contains benzene substituted organic compound which contributes to the high Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD). The high COD concentration will harm the aquatic ecosystem and difficult to treat by using the biological treatment in the wastewater industry. The solar-photocatalytic method was implied to remediate the benzene substituted organic compounds in the wastewater industry. This study involves the effect of operating parameter, removal efficiency and mineralization of the phenol and sodium benzoate. The effects that were observed are in term of initial concentration, catalyst loading, solar irradiation and aeration within the 6 hour of the reaction time by using ZnO as photocatalyst. The results shows sodium benzoate photodegradation rate was higher compared to the phenol at 40 mg/L within 6 hours irradiation time. The percentage of the COD removal for the phenol and sodium benzoate were 79.75 % and 78.95 % respectively. It indicates that the mineralization of phenol was comparable to sodium benzoate.