Performance and mechanistic study on electrocoagulation process for municipal wastewater treatment based on horizontal bipolar electrodes

doi:10.1007/s11783-020-1215-3

Front. Environ. Sci. Eng.

2020, Vol. 14

Issue (3) : 40 https://doi.org/10.1007/s11783-020-1215-3

RESEARCH ARTICLE

Performance and mechanistic study on electrocoagulation process for municipal wastewater treatment based on horizontal bipolar electrodes

Zhenlian Qi¹, Shijie You¹(

), Ranbin Liu², C. Joon Chuah³

¹. State Key Laboratory of Urban Water Resource and Environment, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin 150090, China
². Sino-Dutch R&D Centre for Future Wastewater Treatment Technologies/Beijing Advanced Innovation Center of Future Urban Design, Beijing University of Civil Engineering & Architecture, Beijing 100044, China
³. Nanyang Environment and Water Research Institute, Nanyang Technological University, 1 Cleantech Loop, CleanTech One, Singapore 637141, Singapore

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Abstract

• EC modified with BPEs enhances pollutant removal and reduce energy consumption.

• Increasing BPE number cannot increase flocculants yield exponentially.

• Simulations help to predict the distribution of electrochemical reactions on BPEs.

The design of electrodes is crucial to electrocoagulation process (EC), specifically, with respect to pollutant removal and energy consumption. During EC, the mechanisms for interaction between different electrode arrangement and electrode reactions remain unclear. This work presents an integrated EC process based on horizontal bipolar electrodes (BPEs). In the electrochemical cell, the graphite plates are used as driving cathode while either Fe or Al plates serves as driving anode and BPEs. The BPEs are placed horizontally between the driving electrodes. For municipal wastewater treatment, the pollutant removal efficiency and energy consumption in different configurations of two-dimension electrocoagulation (2D-EC) system with horizontal BPEs were investigated. The removal efficiency of turbidity, total phosphorus and total organic carbon increased significantly with the number of BPEs. Noted that the energy consumption for TP removal decreased by 75.2% with Fe driving anode and 81.5% with Al driving anode than those of 2D-EC, respectively. In addition, the physical field simulation suggested the distributions of potential and current in electrolyte and that of induced charge density on BPE surface. This work provides a visual theoretical guidance to predict the distribution of reactions on BPEs for enhanced pollutant removal and energy saving based on electrocoagulation process for municipal wastewater treatment.

Keywords Electrocoagulation Bipolar electrodes Municipal wastewater Simulations

Corresponding Author(s): Shijie You

Issue Date: 24 February 2020

Cite this article:

Zhenlian Qi,Shijie You,Ranbin Liu, et al. Performance and mechanistic study on electrocoagulation process for municipal wastewater treatment based on horizontal bipolar electrodes[J]. Front. Environ. Sci. Eng., 2020, 14(3): 40.

URL:

https://academic.hep.com.cn/fese/EN/10.1007/s11783-020-1215-3
https://academic.hep.com.cn/fese/EN/Y2020/V14/I3/40

Fig.1 Schematic illustration of (a) conventional two-dimension electrocoagulation and (b) the integration of electrocoagulation and horizontally placed BPE.

Fig.2 Electrochemical dissolution of Al and Fe electrodes with different combination of sacrificial electrodes. (Control, 1Fe, 2Fe, 1Al, 2Al, 1Fe/1Al represent the operation systems of EC, WEC-1Fe/BPE, WEC-2Fe/BPE, WEC-1Al/BPE, WEC-2Al/BPE, WEC-1Fe/1Al/BPE, respectively at the applied current of 0.5 A and reaction time of 10 min).

Fig.3 Effect of integrations of EC and BPEs on the removal of (a) turbidity, (b) TOC, (c) TP and (d) TN of the municipal wastewater in 10 min.

Fig.4 Cell voltage during the electrocoagulation for (a) Fe driving anode and (b) Al driving anode with different BPEs combinations under constant current of 0.5 A.

Fig.5 Electric energy consumption for removal of (a) TOC and (b) TP with different configuration of BPEs.

Fig.6 Simulation of distribution of potential and current flow in the solution of EC system integrated with (a) zero, (b) one, (c) two and (d) three BPEs in the x?z plane.

Fig.7 Simulation of distribution of charges on the surface of (a) zero, (b) one, (c) two and (d) three BPEs in the x?z plane.

Fig.8 SEM images of corrosion morphology along the length of horizontal Fe/BPE at location of (a₁) 0 mm, (b₁) 10 mm, (c₁) 40 mm and (d₁) 50 mm; along the length of horizontal Al/BPE at the location of (a₂) 0 mm, (b₂) 10 mm, (c₂) 40 mm and (d₂) 50 mm distanced from the anodic end. (Fe-WEC-1Fe/1Al/BPE system, reaction time of 10 min).

Fig.9 (a) Simulation of induced charges on Fe-BPE surface in the x?y plane, (b) Schematic diagram of side-view mechanism in the x?z plane.

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