Studies on the Removal of the Emerging Contaminant Mefenamic Acid from Aqueous Media Using Advanced Oxidation Processes

Abstract

newline Emerging contaminants or contaminants of emerging concern are wide variety of newlinechemical compounds which are globally released into the environmental newlinecompartments due to various anthropogenic activities. Pharmaceutical compounds newlineare a major class of emerging aquatic micro pollutants which are reaching the newlineenvironment through the effluent from waste treatment plants and through newlineexcretion of human and livestock.Most of these pharmaceutical compounds are newlinecomplex organic compounds which are non biodegradable and persistent in nature. newlineThe conventional water and waste water purification systems are incapable of newlineeffectively removing these diverse compounds from water. Advanced treatment newlinetechniques are to be adopted as tertiary treatments steps for the effective removal newlineof pharmaceutical compounds from aquatic media. Advanced oxidation processes newlinewhich aim at the complete mineralization of contaminants has a great potential in newlineremoving these compounds. Mefenamic acid (MEF) is a commonly used pharmacetical compound that exhibit newlinea wide range of applicability like anti-inflammatory, analgesic, antipyretic and newlineantiviral activity. MEF has been considered as third class priority pollutant in newlineEuropean Union. Prolonged exposure of water containing trace levels of MEF can newlinecause upset stomach symptoms, skin rashes and diarrhoea. In the present work the newlineremoval of MEF from aqueous media by using four different advanced oxidation newlinemethods such as chemical Fenton, photo Fenton, photo peroxide oxidation, and newlinesolar photo catalytic process has been studied. The comparison of the process newlinebased on the removal efficiency and the cost of operation has been made. All the advanced oxidation processes used were experimentally designed using newlinecentral composite design method (CCD) and the response was analysed using newlineresponse surface methodology (RSM). Model equations were developed for the newlineresponse of all the four processes studied for predicting the removal at different newlineoperating conditions.