Improving energy efficiency and economic feasibility of photocatalytic treatment of synthetic and real textile wastewater using bagasse fly ash modified TiO2

TERI (The Energy and Resources Institute) has recently developed a novel wastewater treatment technology called TERI Advanced Oxidation Technology (TADOX), which provides an end-to-end treatment of textile and dyeing industry wastewater within a few hours without any kind of bioremediation in the treatment trail. It involves UV/n-TiO2 Photocatalysis during secondary treatment; Photocatalysis, is a promising approach for treating difficult wastewater, however there is always effort to reduce cost and electrical energy consumption. In this pursuit, TiO2 was modified using Bagasse Fly Ash (BFA) to form a nanocomposite BFA-TiO2, which led to increased surface area and higher adsorptive capacity as compared to Bare TiO2. Both nanomaterials and BFA alone were characterized using X-Ray Diffraction (XRD), Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM), Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM), Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR) and BET (Brunauer-Emmet-Teller) surface area analysis. These nanomaterials acted as photocatalysts in TADOX treatment of synthetic dye bath and real textile & dyeing wastewater and the overall performance of both materials was evaluated based on % Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD) removal, Electrical energy per Order (EEO) and Electrical energy consumption per unit wastewater treatment (EEvolume). Further, the cost of treatment per kg COD removed and overall cost of treatment per unit wastewater treated were also calculated. Results indicate that modification of TiO2 with BFA appears to be a promising approach towards higher % COD removal, lower EEO and lower cost of treatment per kg CO