Degradation study of some pharmaceuticals in commercial formulation by electro-Fenton process using a dimensionally stable anode cathode: Analytical technique, optimization conditions, and energy consumption

The aim of this work was to degrade pharmaceuticals such as amoxicillin (AMX), ceftriaxone (CTX), and Telebrix (TLX) by electro-Fenton (EF) process using a dimensionally stable anode (DSA) cathode, Pt-RuO2-IrO2 (PRI). For this purpose, the optimal conditions of degradation, the pseudo-first-order kinetics, the current efficiency, the electrochemical energy consumption (EEC), and the energy cost have been investigated. A spectrophotometric analysis technique has been developed. It is a simple, fast, linear, reliable, and selective technique with LOD = 0.013 g/L and LOQ = 0.04 g/L. The optimum working conditions determined are: Fe2+ = 0.2 mM, pH = 3, j = 20 mA/cm(2), and (Pt, PRI) as electrode pair. Under these conditions, the EF process leads to a conversion of the parent compound. In addition, the degradation of compounds by EF follows pseudo-first-order kinetics. The EEC for the degradation of 1 kg COD of an organic compound is 99.48, 66.86, and 50.32 kWh kg COD-1 for AMX, CTX, and TLX respectively. The energy cost for processing these compounds is $4.92 (AMX), $10.03 (CTX), and $7.55 (TLX) with current efficiencies between 26% and 51%. Ultimately, the EF process using PRI at the cathode can be used for the treatment of real wastewater from health centres under optimal conditions.