Advanced oxidation of chemicals for water, wastewater and hazardous waste remediation has a relatively long history of application. However, one drawback to its wider use is likely the formation of reaction by-products, which result from the radical chemistry. This drawback is similar for any treatment technology which aims at the destruction (treatment) of chemicals. Interestingly, we detailed the radical chemistry of Methyl tert-Butyl Ether MTBE) in an exhaustive review of the literature and came to the conclusion that advanced oxidation processes would not be economical for solutions of MTBE at other than low concentrations. This paper will overview the fundamental radical chemistry of interest for treatment of any organic compound based on free radically mediated processes, using MTBE as an example pollutant. For a relatively small and simple compound it was surprising that the proposed mechanism for its destruction was composed of 289 reactions, many of which no experiment data exist. To develop a predictive kinetic model for the destruction of MTBE a simplified kinetic model would be necessary.

Studies in advanced oxidation: Understanding the details of free radical chemistry

254th National Meeting (2017)

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