Coupled solar photo-fenton process with aerobic sequential batch reactor for treatment of pharmaceutical wastewater

The pharmaceutical wastewater was treated by coupling solar photo-Fenton process with an aerobic sequential batch reactor (SBR). Pharmaceutical wastewater has high COD and very low BOD and hence it is difficult to treat them biologically. The main purpose is to determine optimal photo-Fenton conditions (i.e., pH, ferrous ion concentration, H2O2 dosage and treatment time) for making wastewater biocompatible and suitable for subsequent biological treatment. Solar photo-Fenton process enhances biodegradability and a significant enhancement of biodegradability was found at the optimum conditions of pH = 3, H2O2 = 5 g L-1, Fe2+ = 1 g L-1 and irradiation time = 60 min. At this condition BOD3/COD ratio increased from 0.015 to 0.54. The coupled solar photo-Fenton with SBR process obtained COD removal of 98% and the effluent COD concentration was found to be 100 mg/L, which meets the requirements of the discharge standard.