Application of H2O and UV/H2O2 processes for enhancing the biodegradability of reactive black 5 dye

Leather processing is a traditional activity in India during which many organic and inorganic chemicals are added while part of it is absorbed by the leather, the remaining chemicals are discharged along with the effluent. The effluent contains both easily biodegradable and not easily biodegradable synthetic organics like dyes, syntans. Easily biodegradable organics are removed in the existing biological treatment units whereas synthetic organics present in the wastewater are mostly adsorbed over the microbes. As the tannery effluent contains complex chemicals, it is difficult to ascertain the degradation of specific pollutants. To determine the increase in the biodegradability, one of the complex and synthetic organic chemical like dye used in the tanning operation was selected for Advanced Oxidation Process (AOPs) treatment for cleaving complex organics and its subsequent treatment in aerobic process. In the present study, Reactive Black 5 Dye used in the tanning operation was selected for Hydrogen Peroxide (H2O2) and UV/H2O2 pre-treatment for different operating conditions like pH, contact time and different volume of H2O2. A comparison was made between the untreated, Hydrogen Peroxide (H2O2) and UV/H2O2 treated effluent in order to ascertain the influence of AOP on the improvement of biodegradability of effluent. An increase in the BOD5/COD ratio from 0.21 to 0.435 was achieved in the UV/H2O2 pre-treatment process. This pre-treated effluent was further subjected to aerobic process. Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD5) and Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD) removal efficiency of the UV/H2O2 pre-treated dye solution in the aerobic process was found to be 86.39% and 77.82% when compared to 52.43% of BOD5 and 51.55% of COD removal efficiency without any pre-treatment. Hence from these results, to increase the biodegradability of Reactive Black 5 dye pre-treatment methods like H2O2 and UV/H2O2 can be used prior to biological treatment process.