A study on development of indigenous integrated microwave-ultraviolet reactor for degradation of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">p</i>-cresol in aqueous solution

Abstract

<span style="mso-bidi-language:TA" lang="EN-GB">An integrated microwave-ultraviolet (MW-UV) reactor has been developed indigenously and used for the degradation of aqueous <i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">p-</i>cresol. The <i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">p-</i>cresol degradation is carried out in six phases, namely (i) microwave irradiation (MW), (ii) photodegradation with UV light (UV), (iii) simultaneous microwave and ultraviolet radiations (MW-UV), (iv) microwave in presence of TiO₂ (MW-TiO₂), (v) photodegradation by UV and TiO₂ (UV-TiO₂), and (vi) simultaneous MW and UV irradiations in presence of TiO₂ (MW-UV-TiO₂). T<span style="mso-bidi-language: TA" lang="EN-GB">he order of the degradation efficiency is found to be MW-UV-TiO₂&gt;UV-TiO₂&gt;MW-TiO₂&gt;UV-MW&gt;UV&gt;MW. The complete degradation of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">p-</i>cresol is obtained by MW-UV-TiO₂and it is three-fold economical in catalyst requirement than UV-TiO₂. The degradation of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">p-</i>cresol followed pseudo first order reaction and the reaction rate (k) for MW-UV-TiO₂ is found to be 3 times greater than that for UV-TiO₂. The MW-UV-TiO₂ is also 2.3 times efficient in the removal of total organic carbon than UV-TiO₂. It is also observed that the unit operating cost of conventional UV-TiO₂ and MW-UV-TiO₂is almost same.

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