Advanced photochemical oxidation of emergent micropollutants: Carbamazepine

The combination of UV radiation with hydrogen peroxide has been widely used for the photodegradation of pollutants in aqueous solutions. Statistical design of experiments is a powerful tool to optimize this kind of process. Initial hydrogen peroxide concentration, pH and temperature were considered as the variables for the process optimization. The interactions existing between these three variables were analyzed. Initial concentration of hydrogen peroxide proved to be the most important variable conditioning the removal efficiency, followed by temperature, and pH shows a non-significant positive influence along the whole operation interval. The ANOVA test reported significance for five of the nine involved variables. The Response Surface Methodology technique was used to optimize carbamazepine degradation. Under optimal conditions (hydrogen peroxide concentration = 0.38 center dot 10(-3) mol L-1, pH = 1 and temperature = 35.6 degrees C) total carbamazepine degradation was achieved.