Supported TiO₂solar photocatalysis at semi-pilot scale: degradation of pesticides found in citrus processing industry wastewater, reactivity and influence of photogenerated species

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Thiabendazole, imazalil and acetamiprid, pesticides found in wastewater in the citrus fruit processing industry, are recalcitrant to biological treatments. This study deals with the preparation of TiO 2 supported on glass beads and its use as a photocatalyst in a compound parabolic collector (CPC) solar reactor for the elimination of a mixture of these pesticides (100 μg L −1 each) in different water matrices.

Performance of different advanced oxidation processes for tertiary wastewater treatment to remove the pesticide acetamiprid

“…UV/TiO 2 was run using 50, 100, and 200 mg TiO 2 L −1 at 20 W m −2 UVC, which are concentrations similar to those reported in other work on micropollutants. 37,38 In DW, photocatalysis proved to be one of the fastest AOPs, removing acetamiprid in less than 1 min for all catalyst concentrations (Fig. 2).…”

Dissipation, metabolism and sorption of pesticides used in fruit-packaging plants: Towards an optimized depuration of their pesticide-contaminated agro-industrial effluents

“…Recent semi-pilot studies showed that the combination of membrane bioreactor and advanced oxidation processes could effectively remove TBZ from wastewaters . Similarly, TiO 2 solar photocatalysis showed high depuration efficiency for the removal of IMZ, TBZ (Jimenez et al, 2015) and OPP (Khodja et al, 2001) from wastewaters. However those methods produce several oxidized metabolites which are of unknown toxicity compared to the parent compound plus their full scale implementation is still pending.…”

Characterization of the biodegradation, bioremediation and detoxification capacity of a bacterial consortium able to degrade the fungicide thiabendazole

“…This system showed high removal efficiency for TBZ (EC 2001) but its high cost halted its wider implementation in fruit-packaging plants in the Mediterranean region. More recent bench-scale studies showed that photo-Fenton treatment (Carra et al 2015) and TiO 2 solar photocatalysis (Jimenez et al 2015) could effectively remove TBZ from effluents. However these tests were performed at concentration levels (lg L -1 ) which are multi-fold lower than the levels found in the effluents and there is concern about the numerous oxidized metabolites produced whose toxicity is unknown.…”