Treatment of pre-treated real textile industry wastewater by integration of physical, chemical and biological methods in the presence of rice husk and walnut shell based materials

This study investigates the application of a hybrid treatment process and their effects on the real textile wastewater in order to obtain irrigation water which can be used in agriculture. In order to develop a hybrid process that is economical, energy-saving and minimizes the amount of solid waste; advanced oxidation processes (photo-fenton-like and catalytic wet air oxidation), adsorption and microbial fuel cell(MFC) methods were used. In addition, microbial fuel cell was performed as a single step. Walnut shell, rice husk based adsorbents and catalysts with active site BiBO3 (B:Fe,Ni) were selected in order to perform the methods and characterizations were realized. On the path starting with photo-fenton-like oxidation; the best TOC removal was achieved with the iron-containing and walnut shell based catalysts, and on another path that was started with catalytic wet air oxidation, nickel-containing and walnut shell based catalyst was selected. Adsorption studies were carried out with activated carbon obtained from walnut shell which was determined according to adsorbent characterization results. At the end of adsorption step, 87 % of TOC removal, 57-58% of COD removal were observed. The MFC method was applied both as the last step of the hybrid process and on the wastewater as a single step. After the adsorption step, irrigation water standards were provided for color, turbidity and TOC but it was observed that the MFC method did not have a positive effect on the turbidity at the final stage. 97 % TOC removal was provided when MFC applied alone on wastewater.