Treatment of wastewater by a combined technique of adsorption, electrocoagulation followed by membrane separation

Dehghani, Yousef; Honarvar, Bizhan; Azhdarpour, Amin; Nabipour, Moein

doi:10.22104/aet.2021.5133.1394

Treatment of wastewater by a combined technique of adsorption, electrocoagulation followed by membrane separation

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

Department of Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Islamic Azad University, Marvdasht Branch, Marvdasht, Iran

10.22104/aet.2021.5133.1394

Abstract

In this study, a combined lab-scale purification system was set up to treat wastewater from the National Iranian Oil Company. The combined system was composed of three main sections: pre-filtration using activated carbon filter (ACF), electrocoagulation (EC) system, and a filtration section (MF followed by RO). The performance of the treatment system was evaluated by measuring heavy metals, BOD, COD, TDS, TSS, and O&G. The results showed that pre-filtration using ACF could lead to the removal of the BOD, COD, TDS, TSS, and O&G by 24.6%, 21.12%, 31.07%, 36.9% and 8.49%, respectively; the heavy metals were removed significantly. In the EC section, heavy metals were rejected by more than 98% using both the Al and Fe electrode, except for the Cr ions that were mostly removed with Fe electrodes. The removal of BOD, COD, TDS, TSS, and O&G using the Al and Fe electrode was 95.6%, 96%, 91%, 76.6%, and 98.6% and 93.2%, 92.1%, 76%, 83% and 99%, respectively. EC followed by MF/RO filtration led to a remarkable purification performance, and the rejection rate of all pollutants was obtained over 99% after this section. The experimental results indicated that the optimum time for ACF and EC processes were 20 and 50 minutes.

Keywords

Main Subjects

water and wastewater treatment

References

[1] Hayes, T., Arthur, D. (2004, October). Overview of emerging produced water treatment technologies. In11th annual international petroleum environmental conference, Albuquerque, NM (Vol. 201512).

[2] Igunnu, E. T., Chen, G. Z. (2014). Produced water treatment technologies. International journal of low-carbon technologies, 9(3), 157-177.

[3] Healy, R. W., Alley, W. M., Engle, M. A., McMahon, P. B., Bales, J. D. (2015). The water-energy nexus: an earth science perspective. US geological survey circular, (1407).

[4] Dickhout, J. M., Moreno, J., Biesheuvel, P. M., Boels, L., Lammertink, R. G. H., De Vos, W. M. (2017). Produced water treatment by membranes: a review from a colloidal perspective. Journal of colloid and interface science, 487, 523-534.

[5] Fakhru’l-Razi, A., Pendashteh, A., Abdullah, L. C., Biak, D. R. A., Madaeni, S. S., Abidin, Z. Z. (2009). Review of technologies for oil and gas produced water treatment. Journal of hazardous materials, 170(2-3), 530-551.

[6] Gogate, P. R., Pandit, A. B. (2004). A review of imperative technologies for wastewater treatment II: hybrid methods. Advances in environmental research, 8(3-4), 553-597.

[7] Al-Ghouti, M. A., Al-Kaabi, M. A., Ashfaq, M. Y., Da’na, D. A. (2019). Produced water characteristics, treatment and reuse: A review. Journal of water process engineering, 28, 222-239.

[8] Hube, S., Eskafi, M., Hrafnkelsdóttir, K. F., Bjarnadóttir, B., Bjarnadóttir, M. Á., Axelsdóttir, S., Wu, B. (2020). Direct membrane filtration for wastewater treatment and resource recovery: A review. Science of the total environment, 710, 136375.

[9] Abou Rayan, M., Khaled, I. (2003). Seawater desalination by reverse osmosis (case study). Desalination, 153(1-3), 245-251.

[10] Shahedi, A., Darban, A. K., Taghipour, F., & Jamshidi-Zanjani, A. (2020). A review on industrial wastewater treatment via electrocoagulation processes. Current opinion in electrochemistry, 22, 154-169.

[11] Xu, X., Zhu, X. (2004). Treatment of refectory oily wastewater by electro-coagulation process. Chemosphere, 56(10), 889-894.

[12] Al-Shannag, M., Al-Qodah, Z., Bani-Melhem, K., Qtaishat, M. R., Alkasrawi, M. (2015). Heavy metal ions removal from metal plating wastewater using electrocoagulation: Kinetic study and process performance. Chemical engineering journal, 260, 749-756.

[13] Verma, S., Prasad, B., Mishra, I. M. (2010). Pretreatment of petrochemical wastewater by coagulation and flocculation and the sludge characteristics. Journal of hazardous materials, 178(1-3), 1055-1064.

[14] Tian, X., Song, Y., Shen, Z., Zhou, Y., Wang, K., Jin, X., Liu, T. (2020). A comprehensive review on toxic petrochemical wastewater pretreatment and advanced treatment. Journal of cleaner production, 245, 118692.

[15] Aouni, A., Fersi, C., Ali, M. B. S., Dhahbi, M. (2009). Treatment of textile wastewater by a hybrid electrocoagulation/nanofiltration process. Journal of hazardous materials, 168(2-3), 868-874.

[16] Islam, S. D. U. (2019). Electrocoagulation (EC) technology for wastewater treatment and pollutants removal. Sustainable water resources management, 5(1), 359-380.

[17] Cañizares, P., Jiménez, C., Martínez, F., Sáez, C., Rodrigo, M. A. (2007). Study of the electrocoagulation process using aluminum and iron electrodes. Industrial and engineering chemistry research, 46(19), 6189-6195.

[18] Un, U. T., Koparal, A. S., Ogutveren, U. B. (2009). Electrocoagulation of vegetable oil refinery wastewater using aluminum electrodes. Journal of environmental management, 90(1), 428-433.

[19] El-Taweel, Y. A., Nassef, E. M., Elkheriany, I., Sayed, D. (2015). Removal of Cr (VI) ions from waste water by electrocoagulation using iron electrode. Egyptian Journal of petroleum, 24(2), 183-192.

[20] Cheryan, M. (1986). Ultrafiltration handbook. Technomic Publishing Co. Inc..

[21] Hassan, S. S., Abdel-Shafy, H. I., Mansour, M. S. (2019). Removal of pharmaceutical compounds from urine via chemical coagulation by green synthesized ZnO-nanoparticles followed by microfiltration for safe reuse. Arabian journal of chemistry, 12(8), 4074-4083.

[22] Anis, S. F., Hashaikeh, R., Hilal, N. (2019). Microfiltration membrane processes: A review of research trends over the past decade. Journal of Water Process engineering, 32, 100941.

[23] Slater, C. S., Ahlert, R. C., Uchrin, C. G. (1983). Applications of reverse osmosis to complex industrial wastewater treatment. Desalination, 48(2), 171-187.

[24] Malaeb, L., Ayoub, G. M. (2011). Reverse osmosis technology for water treatment: state of the art review. Desalination, 267(1), 1-8.

[25] Jiang, S., Li, Y., Ladewig, B. P. (2017). A review of reverse osmosis membrane fouling and control strategies. Science of the total environment, 595, 567-583.

[26] Wang, D., Tong, F., Aerts, P. (2011). Application of the combined ultrafiltration and reverse osmosis for refinery wastewater reuse in Sinopec Yanshan plant. Desalination and water treatment, 25(1-3), 133-142.

[27] Baby, R., Hussein, M. Z. (2020). Ecofriendly approach for treatment of heavy-metal-contaminated water using activated carbon of kernel shell of oil Palm. Materials, 13(11), 2627.

[28] Aboli, E., Jafari, D., & Esmaeili, H. (2020). Heavy metal ions (lead, cobalt, and nickel) biosorption from aqueous solution onto activated carbon prepared from citrus limetta leaves. Carbon letters, 30(6), 683-698.

[29] Guo, M., Qiu, G., Song, W. (2010). Poultry litter-based activated carbon for removing heavy metal ions in water. Waste management, 30(2), 308-315.

[30] Devi, R., Singh, V., Kumar, A. (2008). COD and BOD reduction from coffee processing wastewater using Avacado peel carbon. Bioresource technology, 99(6), 1853-1860.

[31] Mortula, M., Shabani, S. (2012). Removal of TDS and BOD from synthetic industrial wastewater via adsorption. In international conference of chemical, biological and environmental engineering, Singapore.

[32] Sia, Y. Y., Tan, I. A. W., Abdullah, M. O. (2017). Adsorption of colour, TSS and COD from palm oil mill effluent (POME) using acid-washed coconut shell activated carbon: Kinetic and mechanism studies. In MATEC web of conferences (Vol. 87, p. 03010). EDP sciences.

[33] Okiel, K., El-Sayed, M., El-Kady, M. Y. (2011). Treatment of oil–water emulsions by adsorption onto activated carbon, bentonite and deposited carbon. Egyptian journal of petroleum, 20(2), 9-15.

[34] Mollah, M. Y., Morkovsky, P., Gomes, J. A., Kesmez, M., Parga, J., Cocke, D. L. (2004). Fundamentals, present and future perspectives of electrocoagulation. Journal of hazardous materials, 114(1-3), 199-210.

[35] García-García, P., López-López, A., Moreno-Baquero, J. M., Garrido-Fernández, A. (2011). Treatment of wastewaters from the green table olive packaging industry using electro-coagulation. Chemical engineering journal, 170(1), 59-66.

[36] Moussa, D. T., El-Naas, M. H., Nasser, M., Al-Marri, M. J. (2017). A comprehensive review of electrocoagulation for water treatment: Potentials and challenges. Journal of environmental management, 186, 24-41.

[37] Fungaro, D. A., Graciano, J. E. (2007). Adsorption of zinc ions from water using zeolite/iron oxide composites. Adsorption science and technology, 25(10), 729-740.

scale vermireactors. Ecological engineering, 36(5), 703–712.

[38] McBride, M. B. (1982). Cu 2+-adsorption characteristics of aluminum hydroxide and oxyhydroxides. Clays and clay minerals, 30(1), 21-28.

[39] Vasudevan, S., Lakshmi, J., Sozhan, G. (2012). Electrocoagulation studies on the removal of copper from water using mild steel electrode. Water environment research, 84(3), 209-219.

[40] Gatsios, E., Hahladakis, J. N., Gidarakos, E. (2015). Optimization of electrocoagulation (EC) process for the purification of a real industrial wastewater from toxic metals. Journal of environmental management, 154, 117-127.

[41] Akbal, F., Camcı, S. (2011). Copper, chromium and nickel removal from metal plating wastewater by electrocoagulation. Desalination, 269(1-3), 214-222.

[42] Cherifi, M., Hazourli, S., Pontvianne, S., Lapicque, F., Leclerc, J. P. (2016). Electrokinetic removal of aluminum and chromium from industrial wastewater electrocoagulation treatment sludge. Desalination and water treatment, 57(39), 18500-18515.

[43] Zaroual, Z., Chaair, H., Essadki, A. H., El Ass, K., Azzi, M. (2009). Optimizing the removal of trivalent chromium by electrocoagulation using experimental design. Chemical engineering journal, 148(2-3), 488-495.

[44] Kim, T., Kim, T. K., Zoh, K. D. (2020). Removal mechanism of heavy metal (Cu, Ni, Zn, and Cr) in the presence of cyanide during electrocoagulation using Fe and Al electrodes. Journal of water process engineering, 33, 101109.

[45] Murugananthan, M., Raju, G. B., Prabhakar, S. (2004). Separation of pollutants from tannery effluents by electro flotation. Separation and purification technology, 40(1), 69-75.

[46] Inan, H., Dimoglo, A., Şimşek, H., Karpuzcu, M. (2004). Olive oil mill wastewater treatment by means of electro-coagulation. Separation and purification technology, 36(1), 23-31.

[47] Canizares, P., Martínez, F., Jiménez, C., Sáez, C., Rodrigo, M. A. (2008). Coagulation and electrocoagulation of oil-in-water emulsions. Journal of hazardous materials, 151(1), 44-51.

[48] Uğurlu, M., Gürses, A., Doğar, Ç., Yalçın, M. (2008). The removal of lignin and phenol from paper mill effluents by electrocoagulation. Journal of environmental management, 87(3), 420-428.

[49] Taqwa, A., Wijarnako, Y. (2019, February). Effectiveness of electrocoagulation method in processing integrated wastewater using aluminum and stainless steel electrodes. In journal of physics: Conference series (Vol. 1167, No. 1, p. 012040). IOP Publishing.

[50] Fouad, Y. O. (2014). Separation of cottonseed oil from oil–water emulsions using electrocoagulation technique. Alexandria engineering journal, 53(1), 199-204.

[51] Arora, M., Maheshwari, R. C., Jain, S. K., Gupta, A. (2004). Use of membrane technology for potable water production. Desalination, 170(2), 105-112.