The treatment of the produced wastewater immerged from the oil and gas industries is
indispensable due to the current environmental awareness and strict regulations. Itβs also
very challenging due to the large amounts of produced wastewater and its complex nature
that cannot be treated effectively by traditional wastewater treatment technologies.
The employment of photocatalysis, based on advanced oxidation processes (AOPs), as an
innovative, environmentally friendly, facile and cost effective technology shall provide the
route of an effective treatment. The main purpose of this research is to optimize the factors
influencing the photocatalytic degradation kinetics of the contaminants into the non-harmful
by products, carbon dioxide and water.
For the aim of the proposed research, zinc oxide was chosen to be as the photocatalyst. It
was synthesized and prepared by the sol-gel method followed by dip-coating on a fiber glass
substrate to create πππ thin film. To test the effect of the photoactivity of the prepared
photocatalyst on the kinetics of the photo-degradation, two parameters were altered and
observed, the catalyst concentration and post-heat treatment temperatures. The
photocatalytic degradation process was experimented on methylene blue as the contaminant
source, and UV rays as the light source. The experimental time was 480 minutes, where the
varied absorbance of methylene blue upon degradation was monitored at an interval of 30
minutes.
The catalyst concentration was varied to attain these 5 values, 0.03, 0.07, 0.1, 0.2 and 0.6M
of zinc oxide. This change investigated how influencing the catalyst loading was on its
surface and in turn on the degradation efficiencies. Interesting results emerged showing that
the catalyst of concentration 0.1M was found to have the highest degradation efficiency
where it was 36% more than the lowest concentration (0.03M), and 10% more than the
highest concentration (0.6M) rendering 0.1M as the optimum catalyst concentration to be
used for the investigation of the annealing temperature.
Moving on, the application of four annealing temperatures, 250, 350, 450, and 550β, were
studied on the 0.1M πππ catalyst to further illustrate the effect of post-heat treatment on the
thin films structure and consequently the rate of degradation. As a result, annealing at 450β
showed the highest degradation kinetics and...
indispensable due to the current environmental awareness and strict regulations. Itβs also
very challenging due to the large amounts of produced wastewater and its complex nature
that cannot be treated effectively by traditional wastewater treatment technologies.
The employment of photocatalysis, based on advanced oxidation processes (AOPs), as an
innovative, environmentally friendly, facile and cost effective technology shall provide the
route of an effective treatment. The main purpose of this research is to optimize the factors
influencing the photocatalytic degradation kinetics of the contaminants into the non-harmful
by products, carbon dioxide and water.
For the aim of the proposed research, zinc oxide was chosen to be as the photocatalyst. It
was synthesized and prepared by the sol-gel method followed by dip-coating on a fiber glass
substrate to create πππ thin film. To test the effect of the photoactivity of the prepared
photocatalyst on the kinetics of the photo-degradation, two parameters were altered and
observed, the catalyst concentration and post-heat treatment temperatures. The
photocatalytic degradation process was experimented on methylene blue as the contaminant
source, and UV rays as the light source. The experimental time was 480 minutes, where the
varied absorbance of methylene blue upon degradation was monitored at an interval of 30
minutes.
The catalyst concentration was varied to attain these 5 values, 0.03, 0.07, 0.1, 0.2 and 0.6M
of zinc oxide. This change investigated how influencing the catalyst loading was on its
surface and in turn on the degradation efficiencies. Interesting results emerged showing that
the catalyst of concentration 0.1M was found to have the highest degradation efficiency
where it was 36% more than the lowest concentration (0.03M), and 10% more than the
highest concentration (0.6M) rendering 0.1M as the optimum catalyst concentration to be
used for the investigation of the annealing temperature.
Moving on, the application of four annealing temperatures, 250, 350, 450, and 550β, were
studied on the 0.1M πππ catalyst to further illustrate the effect of post-heat treatment on the
thin films structure and consequently the rate of degradation. As a result, annealing at 450β
showed the highest degradation kinetics and...