Stress on water resources in the Southwest has forced municipal water planners to consider waters of impaired quality in their water portfolios. Among the water quality challenges that are elevated by potable reuse of wastewater is the presence of persistent trace organic compounds, including pharmaceuticals and anthropogenic chemicals.  Advanced oxidation is frequently employed to remove trace organics during tertiary treatment of wastewater but is energy intensive and expensive.  Furthermore, the kinetics of advanced oxidation processes is inhibited by radical scavenging in the reaction mixtures.  We explore experimentally and model the kinetics of trace organic removal during wastewater effluent polishing during UV/peroxide advanced oxidation from laboratory to pilot scales, including sunlight-driven processes.  The validated model is used to explore reactor redesign for economically optimal treatment of trace organics. The model represents accurately contaminant degradation with no fitted parameters for any contaminant with known second-order rate constant for reaction with hydroxyl radical.

UV/peroxide advanced oxidation for destruction of trace organic contaminants in wastewater

243rd National Meeting (2012)

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