Degradation of Organic Contaminant by Using Dielectric Barrier Discharge Reactor Immersed in Wastewater

Abstract

Dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) was applied to the degradation of an organic contaminant in wastewater. When electrical discharge occurs, the DBD reactor produces oxidative species (ozone) and emits ultraviolet light. For the purpose of using both ozone and ultraviolet light for the degradation of the organic contaminant, the DBD reactor was immersed in the wastewater. The DBD reactor for this paper consisted of a quartz cylinder and a coaxial ceramic tube inside of which a steel rod was placed. High voltage was connected to the steel rod inside of the ceramic tube, and the wastewater was grounded. In this case, the wastewater acted not only as an electrode but also as the cooling medium for the DBD reactor. The performance of this DBD reactor system was evaluated with a simulated wastewater formed with distilled water and an azo dye (Acid Red 27) as the organic contaminant. The experimental results showed that this system was able to completely degrade the organic contaminant within 20 min at typical experimental condition. The energy requirement for the degradation of the organic contaminant was found to be 0.654 kJ/mg