Techno-economic evaluation of electrocoagulation for Cattell slaughterhouse wastewater treatment using aluminum electrodes in batch and continuous experiment

Abstract

Abstract This study aimed to investigate, from technoeconomic point of view, cattle slaughterhouse wastewater (CSWW) treatment via electrocoagulation (EC) technique. A novel lab scale electrocoagulation unit with 3L volume was manufactured and tested. The EC unite contains nine identical cylindrical shape electrodes from aluminum material in connection with controllable DC power supply. Investigation of optimum operating parameters in terms of pH, current density (CD), contact time and electrolyte concentration (TDS) was carried out in batch mode then applied for continuous mode. At each batch, cost analysis was calculated in terms of consumption electrode material and electrical power. The optimum operating conditions at which best removal rate achieved was pH 7, contact time 75 min, TDS = 3000 mg L− 1 and CD of 4 mA.cm− 2. After application of these conditions on continuous flow mode, the removal rate of Chemical oxygen demand (COD), color, turbidity, biological oxygen demand (BOD), and oil, grease were 95.3%, 99.8%, 98.7%, 96.5% and 94.5% respectively. The total electrode consumption and electrical consumption were 0.6 kg m− 3 and 0.87kWh m− 3 with operational cost about 1.5$ m− 3. This proved that EC is techno-economically effective treatment method than other conventional treatment methods for high-rate removal of pollutants of from CSWW.