Combined photocatalytic and Fenton oxidation for oily wastewater treatment

Abstract Our studies focused on assessing the effectiveness of the heterogeneous photocatalysis method (TiO2/UV) and examining the feasibility of photocatalysis coupling with hydrogen peroxide in the treatment of oily industrial wastewater. Our oily water sample was taken from the de-oiling Haoud Berkaoui station entering, which is located 770 km in southern of Algiers); the AOPs investigated are TiO2/UV (photocatalysis) and TiO2/UV/Fe2+/H2O2 (photocatalysis–Fenton’s reagent). This method is used as an alternative or in addition to the conventional treatment techniques (coagulation–flocculation–decantation and filtration…etc). In this work, first we copulated between the two photocatalytic methods (TiO2/UV) and the Fenton’s reagent (H2O2/Fe+2) and then we studied the effect of various experimental factors on the treatment process: pH, initial concentration for each of the TiO2, H2O2, Fe2+, and oil pollutants and finally temperature. The study showed a marked improvement in efficiency on the treated water quality in terms of color, turbidity, and COD under optimized conditions (oil concentration, quantity of catalysts, temperature, Fenton’s reagent concentration, and the pH of the solution)