Electrochemical treatment of simulated sugar industrial effluent: Optimization and modeling using a response surface methodology

The removal of organic compounds from a simulated sugar industrial effluent was investigated through the electrochemical oxidation technique. Effect of various experimental parameters such as current density, concentration of electrolyte and flow rate in a batch electrochemical reactor was studied on the percentage of COD removal and power consumption. The electrochemical reactor performance was analyzed based on with and without recirculation of the effluent having constant inter-electrodes distance. It was found out that the percentage removal of COD increased with the increase of electrolyte concentration and current density. The maximum percentage removal of COD was achieved at 80.74% at a current density of 5 A/dm(2) and 5 g/L of electrolyte concentration in the batch electrochemical reactor. The recirculation electrochemical reactor system parameters like current density, concentration of COD and flow rate were optimized using response surface methodology, while COD removal percents were maximized and power consumption minimized. It has been observed from the present analysis that the predicted values are in good agreement with the experimental data with a correlation coefficient of 0.9888. (C) 2011 Production and hosting by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of King Saud University.