Photocatalytic decolourisation of

industrial wastewater from a soft

drink company
A PRESENTATION BY GROUP 7
500LEVEL
DEPARTMENT OF CHEMICAL ENGINEERING
DEPARTMENT OF CHEMICAL ENGINEERING

OUTLINE
• Introduction
• Aims and Objectives

• Literature survey
• Photocatalysis
• Perinwinkle shell ash

• Methodology
• Results
• Conclusion
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DEPARTMENT OF CHEMICAL ENGINEERING

INTRODUCTION

• Most industries consume large quantities of water and produce large

volumes of waste water from different steps in the production process
• The removal of colour from wastewater is often more important than the
removal of other organic colourless chemicals.
• Decolourisation of effluent from industries especially from textile dyeing,
surface coating and finishing industries is considered important because of
aesthetic and environmental concern

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DEPARTMENT OF CHEMICAL ENGINEERING

Aims and objectives

AIM
The aim of the study investigates how coloured matter in industrial
wastewater obtained from soft drinks can be degraded utilizing
photocatalytic decolourisation.

OBJECTIVES
• Determining the best catalyst to use for the degradation process
• Investigating the effect of catalyst dosage and oxidant concentration on
degradation
• Identifying the kinetics of the photocatalytic reactions.
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DEPARTMENT OF CHEMICAL ENGINEERING

Problem Statement
• The production of soft drinks typically pollutes of the process water with
sugar and other easily biodegradable substances.

• The waste water from this beverage company is often rich in colour and
the release of these colour waste water is a considerable source of non-
aesthetic pollution and eutrophication and can originate dangerous by-
products through oxidation, hydrolysis or other chemical reaction taking
place in the waste water

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DEPARTMENT OF CHEMICAL ENGINEERING

Photocatalysis
• Photocatalysis is the acceleration of a photoreaction in the presence of a
catalyst.

• In catalyzed photolysis, light is absorbed by an adsorbed substrate. In

photogenerated catalysis the photocatalytic activity (PCA) depends on
the ability of the catalyst to create electron-hole pairs, which generate
free radicals (e.g hydroxyl radicals,. OH) able to undergo secondary
reactions.
.

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DEPARTMENT OF CHEMICAL ENGINEERING

Periwinkle shell ash (PSA)

• Periwinkle shell ash (PSA) is obtained by burning periwinkle shell which is
the by-product of periwinkle.

• In zoology is any small greenish marine snail from the class of

gastropod,the largest of the seven classes in the phylum mollusc (Okon
1987; Olorunoje and Olalusi 2003).

• They are herbivorous and found on rocks, stones or pilings between high
and low tide marks; on mud-flats as well as on prop roots of mangrove
trees and in fresh and salt water.
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DEPARTMENT OF CHEMICAL ENGINEERING

Methodology
Materials
• Titanium dioxide, Zinc oxide, Snail shell ash and Periwinkle shell ash were
employed as photocatalysts for this study.

• Industrial wastewater was obtained from a soft drink company in Benin

City, Edo State, Nigeria.

• All other reagents used were of analytical grade

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DEPARTMENT OF CHEMICAL ENGINEERING

Methodology
• The shells were washed and dried in an oven at 110oC to constant mass,
followed by crushing, then calcined at 600oC in a muffle furnace.
• The resulting mass of calcined shells was thereafter sieved to obtain fine
particles (< 350µm) of periwinkle shell ash (PSA).
• The prepared PSA was characterized by determining the composition
using X-Ray Fluorescence (XRF) analysis.
• Complete mineralogical analysis was carried out by X-ray diffraction
(XRD) to determine the ultimate elemental composition of the PSA using
a Philips X-ray diffractometer.
• The same procedure was applied for the characterisation of snail shell
ash (SSA).
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DEPARTMENT OF CHEMICAL ENGINEERING

Methodology
• All the photocatalytic degradation experiments were carried out under
atmospheric conditions in a mechanically agitated Pyrex glass vessel
under visible light.
• The sunlight was directed to the reaction vessel using a converging lens
with a focal length of 14 cm.
• For each experiment, 2g of catalyst was added to the aqueous
wastewater solution and the suspension was magnetically stirred
without any permanent air bubbling.
• The effects of PSA dosage and amount of oxidant (H2O2) on the
degradation efficiency were investigated.
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 Results
• Results of preliminary studies carried out in the absence and presence of
light respectively
Catalyst Percent Decolourization

Without sunlight With sunlight

TiO2 21.59 87.14

ZnO 7.87 63.73

Snail Shell ash 9.04 77.53

Periwinkle shell ash 25.35 89.69

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 Results
• Effect of catalyst dosage on percent degradation of wastewater
12

10
Percentage Degradation (%)

0
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14
Catalyst Dosage (g/L)

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 Results
• Effect of oxidant on percent degradation of wastewater
120

100
Percent degradation

80

60

40

20

0
0 2 4 6 8 10 12
Amount of oxidant

Oxidant, Sunlight and PSA Oxidant and sunlight

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 Results
• Pseudo-first-order kinetics for photocatalytic degradation
1.6

1.4

1.2

60cm3
In (Co/Ci)

0.8 Linear (60cm3)

50cm3
0.6 Linear (50cm3)
30cm3
Linear (30cm3)
0.4

0.2

0
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90
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Time (min)
 Conclusion

The photocatalytic decolourisation of industrial wastewater from a soft drink

company was investigated in this study. The following conclusions can be
drawn from this study.
• Solar irradiation has proved an efficient source of light for the
decolourization of industrial wastewater.
• Photocatalytic decolourisation using periwinkle shell ash catalyst is efficient
in decolourizing wastewater from a soft drinks company.

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 Conclusion

• Almost complete decolourisation (98%) is obtained in 60 min of solar

irradiation when an oxidant is added to the catalyst “periwinkle shell”.
• The photocatalytic decolourisation process proceeds as a pseudo-first order
reaction and its kinetics is well represented by the Langmuir-Hinshelwood
kinetic model.

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DEPARTMENT OF CHEMICAL ENGINEERING

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