The Performance of ZnO-Lemongrass in Photocatalytic Membrane Reactor (PMR) for Palm Oil Mill Second Effluent (POMSE)

Abstract

The nation that produces and exports the greatest amount of palm oil is Malaysia. As the palm oil business expands, so does pollution from palm oil mill second effluent (POMSE) in the country. The photocatalytic membrane reactor (PMR) has demonstrated a significant potential to develop into a "zero" waste process in the water or wastewater sector. The aim of the research is to elucidate the performance of zinc oxide (ZnO) nanoparticles with lemongrass (ZnO-L) as a capping agent in photocatalytic and PMR applications for treating POMSE. The POMSE samples were added to the reactor in the PMR with a pH of 9 and 0.1 g/L of ZnO-L loading. The POMSE pollutant may be degraded in the photocatalytic process during the process, and then the nanoparticles and POMSE pollutants was separated from the effluent through membrane process. The research findings indicate that the ZnO-L 3 from PMR has a greater proportion of colour removal than the photocatalytic only, which is 99.85%. This demonstrates that PMR is superior to the photocatalytic technique. Following that, the ZnO-L 3 had the lowest flux drop (67%), causing reduction of membrane fouling owing to more degradation of pollutants. Therefore, the ZnO-L performance was successfully evaluated, demonstrating that PMR outperforms photocatalytic processes in terms of colour intensity.