Mineralization of C.I. Acid Red 14 azo dye by UV/Fe-ZSM5/H2O2, process

The zeolite Fe-ZSM5 was applied as a heterogeneous catalyst in the photo-Fenton process for mineralization of azo dye Acid Red 14 (AR14). Under optimal conditions (20 mM of H2O2 0.25 g L(-1) of catalyst and initial natural pH of the solution) 76% of total organic carbon (TOC) of a solution containing 40 mg L(-1) of the dye could be removed after 120 min in a 1.0 L tubular, closed-circulation batch photoreactor. Leaching tests and comparative experiments indicated that the application of the heterogeneous catalyst could increase the photo-Fenton process efficiency. A kinetic model was developed for this process and showed that the dye mineralization rate obeyed the pseudo-first order kinetic when the initial concentration of the dye was low. It was also observed that the catalytic behaviour of Fe-ZSM5 could be reproduced in consecutive experiments without a considerable drop in the process efficiency. Estimation of electrical energy consumption (EE/O) of the process as a function of mineralization efficiency revealed that the UV/Fe-ZSM5/H2O2 process not only increased the mineralization efficiency of the process, but also decreased the cost of electrical energy consumed by the process.