Treatment of Petrochemical Waste Water using Fenton Oxidative Method

Abstract

The remediation of surface water contaminated with diesel using the Fenton oxidative method was investigated at ambient temperature (28-34 °C) for effectiveness and optimum conditions were established using UV Spectroscopy. This study was aimed at investigating the effectiveness of Fenton oxidation in remediating diesel-contaminated water. The optimization results for the Fenton-Oxidative showed 400,000 mg/L H2O2 and 300 mg/L FeSO4, and pH adjusted between 2.50-3.00 for all samples. At the end of the chemical remediation experiment, the Fenton-oxidative method proved to be incredibly quick, with the reaction being exothermic and following second order kinetics, 88.80% (from 4297.73 mg/L to 480.57mg/L) removal efficiency of total petroleum hydrocarbon as diesel was realized after one hour under water. The reaction followed a pseudo-first order kinetics with the rate constant of 1.16 x 104 min-1 mg/L. The Fenton-oxidative method for surface water polluted with diesel gave remediation efficiency of 39.62% (Cd), 53.23% (Ni), 21.79% (Pb), 38.89% (Hg), 68.75% (Se), and 82.65% (Cr). Except for Chromium and Selenium, other heavy metal concentrations exceeded the permissible levels recommended by World Health Organization (WHO). This implies that Fenton oxidative method is ineffective in the removal of Cd, Pb, Ni, and Hg from surface water polluted with diesel. The values of the physicochemical parameters of the surface water contaminated with diesel were similar with the unpolluted surface water sample and World Health Organization (WHO) permissible limits. This implies that diesel polluted surface water remediated by Fenton-oxidative method needs post-treatment to improve on its portability for drinking/domestic and agricultural uses. Fenton oxidative technique makes use of what is readily available and cheap, thereby avoiding the use of more complex methods. In conclusion, the Fenton-oxidative method was found to be very effective in remediating surface water contaminated with diesel.