Catalytic versus Pure Ozonation: Insights from Real Wastewater Treatment Performance
Zarak Mahmood1, Yuting Yuan1, Shikha Garg2
1UNSW Centre for Transformational Environmental Technologies, Environmental Protection Technology Industrial Park, Yixing 214200, China.
Environmental Science & Technology
|January 30, 2026
Summary
Heterogeneous catalytic ozonation (HCO) benefits for wastewater treatment are case-specific. While effective for certain organic compounds, HCO offers minimal advantage over pure ozonation in many real wastewater scenarios.
Area of Science:
- Environmental Chemistry
- Water Treatment Technologies
- Catalysis
Background:
- Ozonation is a key advanced oxidation process for wastewater treatment.
- Heterogeneous catalytic ozonation (HCO) is proposed to enhance ozone efficiency.
- Real wastewater matrices present complex challenges for treatment processes.
Purpose of the Study:
- To evaluate the performance of pure ozonation versus HCO in diverse real wastewater streams.
- To determine the conditions under which HCO offers advantages over conventional ozonation.
- To understand the influence of wastewater organic composition on HCO efficacy.
Main Methods:
- Comparative study of pure ozonation and HCO.
- Testing across multiple real wastewater types with varying organic loads.
- Analysis of ozone utilization and organic compound removal efficiency.
Main Results:
- HCO performance is highly dependent on wastewater characteristics.
- Favorable responses to HCO observed in membrane concentrates (rich in humic/fulvic compounds).
- Limited or no improvement with HCO in coking wastewater and alkaline electroplating wastewater.
- Significant improvement in acidic Fenton-treated chemical wastewater due to limited HO• generation.
Conclusions:
- The added value of catalysts in HCO is often diminished by ozone's inherent reactivity and hydroxyl radical (HO•) generation, especially under alkaline conditions.
- HCO is not universally superior to pure ozonation for all real wastewater types.
- Case-specific evaluation is crucial for implementing HCO effectively in industrial wastewater treatment.
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