Efcacy of electrocoagulation and electrooxidation for the purication of

wastewater generated from gelatin production plant

N. Lakshmi Kruthika, S. Karthika, G. Bhaskar Raju*, S. Prabhakar
National Metallurgical Laboratory Madras Centre, CSIR Madras Complex, Taramani, Chennai 600113, India
Introduction
Gelatin is a heterogeneous mixture of proteins derived from the
collagen of animal hide and bone. It is commonly used in industries
such as food, pharmaceuticals, photography, cosmetics and wine
ning [1]. The process of gelatin production from bones includes
variety of unit operations such as acidulation, liming, washing,
extraction, ltration, deionization, evaporation, sterilization,
drying and blending. During de-mineralization of bone chips, di-
calcium phosphate is produced as byproduct. The initial concen-
tration of gel in extracted gelatin solutions is typically 5% and the
same is enriched to 30% by multi-stage vacuum evaporator. The
concentrated, puried gelatin solution is then sterilized at 140 8C
for bacterial control. The dried gel with 1112% of moisture is
ground to coarse granules and packed. During the process,
approximately 300 m
3
of wastewater is generated for each metric
ton of bones processed. It was reported that the waste generated
from gelatin industry is rich in nitrogen, calcium and phosphorus
[2]. However, the odor is highly obnoxious and nuisance to the
habitation. The vermiculture based technology was suggested to
treat wastewater from gelatin production unit [3]. The bench scale
study revealed that around 87% of COD removal could be achieved
in 16 h [4] by activated sludge aeration process. Since most of the
suspended solids are partially hydrophobic, the settling behavior
of suspended solids would be very slow by coagulation. In recent
years, zero discharge norms were imposed to restrict the discharge
of wastewater in to the environment. The recycling of the treated
wastewater is being enforced to minimize the percolation of
contaminants to groundwater and to save the water resources.
Hence, electrochemical techniques were explored to treat waste-
water from gelatin production plant.
In recent years, electrochemical techniques are gaining impor-
tance for the treatment of wastewater containing dyes [5,6],
tannins [7], hexavalent chromium [8] and phenols [9]. The efcacy
of electrochemical techniques for the purication of industrial
wastewater containing variety of pollutants was reported to be
tremendous [1012]. The principles of electrocoagulation and
electrooxidation technologies, design of electrochemical reactors
was extensively reviewed and reported by Chen [13]. In the
present work, the efcacy of electrocoagulation and electrooxida-
tion for the treatment of efuents generated from gelatin
production plant was reported.
Materials and methods
Electrochemical reactors
Electrocoagulation reactor with a working volume of 1.0 L was
fabricated using acrylic material. It is a continuous type reactor
Journal of Environmental Chemical Engineering 1 (2013) 183188
A R T I C L E I N F O
Article history:
Received 6 February 2013
Accepted 24 April 2013
Keywords:
Electrocoagulation
Electrooxidation
MMO electrode
TiO
2
nanotubes
Purication
Electrode scaling
A B S T R A C T
The efuents of gelatin production plant are highly complex and difcult to treat by conventional
methods. The electrochemical techniques involving electrocoagulation and electrooxidation were
attempted for the treatment of wastewater from gelatin production plant. Around 60% of TOC removal
was achieved by electrocoagulation using aluminumas anode. However, the performance was severely
affected due to scaling of the electrodes. The high concentration of dissolved calcium was found to be
responsible for scaling of electrodes. To minimize the scaling, calcium was precipitated as CaCO
3
using
bicarbonate. After the calcium was precipitated, scaling was reduced and the performance of the
electrodes was drastically improved. The effect of applied current density and owrate on TOC removal
was studied and the energy consumption for electrocoagulation was estimated. Since the removal of
pollutants by electrocoagulation is only partial, the wastewater was processed further by
electrooxidation using IrO
2
Ta
2
O
5
coated Ti electrode and TiO
2
nanotubes grown on titanium sheet
(TiO
2
NT) as electrodes. The TOC removal was drastically improved in the presence of TiO
2
NT electrode.
2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved.
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +91 44 22542077; fax: +91 44 22541027.
E-mail addresses: gbraju55@gmail.com, GBRAJU55@HOTMAIL.COM
(G. Bhaskar Raju).
Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect
Journal of Environmental Chemical Engineering
j our n al h o mepag e: w ww. el sevi er . co m / l ocat e/ j ec e
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http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jece.2013.04.017
with an inlet at the bottom and outlet at top of the reactor as shown
in Fig. 1a. The contents in the reactor are kept under agitation using
a magnetic stirrer. Stainless steel 316 and aluminum rods with a
minimum purity of 98% and measuring 1.2 cm diameter and 8 cm
length were used as electrodes. The anode and cathode were
immersed in wastewater vertically. The gap between the electro-
des was maintained at 1.0 cm. The surface area of cathode and
anode was estimated to be 35.04 cm
2
and 31.27 cm
2
respectively.
The electrolysis was carried out under galvanostatic conditions.
The schematic diagram of experimental set-up is shown in Fig. 1a.
The coagulated sample was allowed to settle for half an hour before
the supernatant solution was analyzed for TOC.
Electro oxidation was performed in a batch type reactor with a
working volume of 0.350 L. All the experiments were conducted at
a constant temperature of 25 8C with the help of water bath. An
array of TiO
2
nanotubes grown on titanium sheet was used as
anode and platinum foil as cathode for electrooxidation. The
surface area of the titanium electrode covered with nanotubes is
4.0 cm
2
. In the case of electrooxidation, the electrodes were
separated by 0.5 cm.
Electrodes were connected to the respective terminals of the DC
rectier and energized for a required duration at a known current
density. Potentiostat/galvanostat system (Model-KM064, K-Pas
Instronics Engineers, India) with digital indicators was used as DC
source. The schematic diagram of experimental set-up is shown in
Fig. 1b. The kinetics of TOC removal during the experiment was
ascertained by TOC measurements.
Preparation of Ti nanotubes electrode
The TiO
2
-nanotube array grown on Ti sheet by anodization
method [14] was used as anode for electrooxidation. The titanium
sheets measuring 0.2 cm thick 2.0 cm breadth and 2.0 cm length
were initially mirror polished and then ultrasonically de-greased.
These sheets were anodized in the presence of 95% ethylene glycol
(99% purity) and 0.025 M sodium uoride electrolyte. The
anodization was continued for a period of 6 h at 20 V. After
anodization, the samples were washed with water and ultra-
sonicated in acetone to remove surface debris. The anodized
amorphous TiO
2
nanotubes were annealed at 480 8C in oxygen
atmosphere for 6 h with heating and cooling rate of 1 8C min
1
to
obtain crystallized samples. The morphology and array of
nanotubes are presented in Fig. 2. The SEM images indicate that
the average diameter and wall thickness of the nanotubes is
around 80 nm and 15 nm respectively. The height/length of each
tube is observed to be more than 500 nm. From SEMEDAX data,
the weight percentage of O, Ti and Ta was found to be 34.23, 63.23
and 1.96, respectively.
Analytical techniques
The aqueous solutions were analyzed for dissolved solids,
turbidity, water hardness, etc. according to the standard methods
suggested by American Public Health Association [15]. For TOC
analysis, all the samples were kept for 1 h to allow particles to
settle. The supernatant solution was siphoned out and subjected to
TOC analyzer (Shimadzu VCSN/CPN Model). The homogenized
sample was injected in to reaction chamber packed with catalyst.
The carbon is oxidized to CO
2
in the presence of catalyst and this
gas is quantitatively estimated by non-dispersive infrared analyz-
er. The TOC was deduced from the measurements of total carbon
and inorganic carbon.
Efuent sample
Portion of the wastewater sample from the main line was
collected intermittently over a period of 12 h. The wastewater
sample thus collected was uniformly mixed and stored in a plastic
drum. The representative sample was analyzed for various
parameters and the characteristics of the same are presented in
Table 1. The results indicate that the concentration of total
dissolved solids (TDS) is 55 g L
1
and consequently the conductiv-
ity of wastewater is also high. The chloride (34 g) and calcium
(17.6 g) resulted due to neutralization of acidic wastewater by lime
are the major contributors of TDS. The total organic carbon (TOC)
was estimated to be 200 ppm. The high alkalinity and turbidity was
due to the presence of colloidal size lime particles.
Results and discussion
Electrocoagulation
Laboratory scale and continuous type electrocoagulation
experiments were conducted at different current densities using
aluminum electrodes. The effective surface area of electrodes was
uniformly maintained at 31.27 cm
2
in all the experiments. The
removal of TOC over a period of 9 h was studied and the results are
presented in Table 2. It is apparent that the TOC removal varies
from 38% to 54% depending on the applied current but not on
Fig. 1. (a) Electrocoagulation reactor (1 and 2: electrodes; 3: magnetic stirrer; 4:
magnetic paddle; 5: thermometer) and (b) electrooxidation reactor (1 and 2:
electrodes; 3: magnetic stirrer; 4: magnetic paddle; 5: thermometer).
Fig. 2. High resolution scanning electron micrograph of TiO
2
nanotubes.
N. Lakshmi Kruthika et al. / Journal of Environmental Chemical Engineering 1 (2013) 183188 184
electrode geometry. It was observed that the dissolution is
prominent at the edges and corners of the electrode. The hexagonal
rod has slowly become cylindrical within rst 1 h of electrolysis. The
preferential dissolution of edges and corners may be attributed due
to high stress and the presence of active centers. It is known from
Faradays laws that by increasing the current, the dissolution of
anode increases irrespective of the electrode geometry. Accordingly
coagulation of suspended solids was also increased and thereby the
TOC removal. Conversely, Keithley 2182 a nanovolt meter has
indicated increase in resistivity and as a result the temperature of the
wastewater was increased to 50 8C during electrolysis. The
examination of electrodes has revealed that the cathode surface
was coated with white solid. When the aluminum cathode was
replaced by stainless steel 316 rod, the problem of coating was
drastically improved and the TOC removal was increased to 68%.
Thus, the performance of SS 316 was found to be better cathode to
improve the TOC removal without scaling problems. Electrocoagu-
lation was conducted at an applied current density of 12.6 mA cm
2
and ow rate of 1.0 L/h using aluminum rods as anode.
The anodic dissolution of aluminum can be represented as:
Anode : 2Al
0
! 2Al
3
6e

(1)
Cathode : 6H
2
O 6e

! 3H
2
6OH

(2)
Net reaction:
2Al 6H
2
O ! 2AlOH
3
3H
2
basic condition (3)
2Al 6H
2
O ! 2AlOH
3
6H

acidic condition (4)

It is known that depending on the pH of aqueous solution, Al
3+
could result in the formation of mono and poly nuclear complexes/
species such as AlOH
2+
, Al(OH)
2
+
, Al(OH)
3
, Al(OH)
4

, Al(OH)
n
(3n)
,
Al
2
(OH)
2
4+
, Al
7
(OH)
17
4+
, Al
13
(OH)
34
5+
, Al
3
(OH)
4
5+
, Al(OH)
6
3
with
different charge. In addition to anodic dissolution, Al
3+
ions are
released from the surface due to corrosion and pH of the aqueous
solution (chemical dissolution). At high pH values, preferential
dissolution of the protective oxide layer (boehmite) was suggested
as per the following reaction [16].
AlOOH OH

! AlO
2

H
2
O (5)
The dissolved metal ions and metal oxy-hydroxides aid the
coagulation of suspended solids. It is generally accepted that
coagulation of suspended solids is brought about primarily by
reduction of net surface charge to a point where they hold together
by inter molecular Vander Waals forces. The resistivity of the
electrodes was measured before and after electrocoagulation. The
resistivity of original aluminum cylindrical rod and hexagonal rod
before using them for electrocoagulation was measured to be
0.3774 mV and 0.3385 mV, respectively. After 9 h of electro-
coagulation, the resistivity of these electrodes was found to
increase at higher applied current of above 400 mA. This behavior
could be explained due to the formation of Al
2
O
3
lm at the
electrode surface which is non-conductive [17]. Despite the
resistivity is less than the original sample at low current densities,
the coating of white substance on the electrodes was observed. The
decrease in resistivity may be explained due to formation of
conductive lm on the electrode surface. The photograph revealing
the scaling of electrodes is shown in Fig. 3. The coated material was
scrapped from the surface and analyzed for its chemical assay. The
results revealed that CaCl
2
is the major compound. The coating of
CaCl
2
is obvious when the wastewater contain 17.6 g of Ca
2+
and
34 g of Cl

per liter. At very high concentrations, the electropho-

retic mobility of conductive ions towards the electrode may
dominate the process of anodic dissolution of metal. In other
Table 1
Characteristics of raw efuent.
S. no. Parameters Results
1 Appearance Turbid
2 pH value at 25 8C 5.90
3 Color (Hazen unit) 25 Hu
4 Odour Objectionable
5 Turbidity as NTU NTU
6 Electrical conductivity at 25 8C 600 mV/cm
7 Phenolphthaline alkalinity as CaCO
3
Nil
8 Total alkalinity as CaCO
3
1020 ppm
9 Total hardness as CaCO
3
44,481 ppm
10 Calcium hardness as CaCO
3
44,044 ppm
11 Calcium as Ca
2+
17,618 ppm
12 Magnesium hardness as MgCO
3
437 ppm
13 Magnesium as Mg
2+
104.9 ppm
14 Total suspended solids 168 ppm
15 Total dissolved solids 54,984 ppm
16 Chlorine as Cl

34,083 ppm
17 Sulphur as SO
4
2
11.54 ppm
18 Total iron 1.59 ppm
19 Silica (reactive) as SiO
2
68.6 ppm
20 Carbonate hardness 1020 ppm
21 Non-carbonate hardness 43,461 ppm
22 Free residual chlorine <0.2 ppm
23 TOC 194 ppm
24 COD 1280 ppm
25 BOD at 27 8C for 3 days 284 ppm
Table 2
Effect of electrode material and geometry on TOC removal (sample: as received,
duration of experiment: 9 h, ow rate: 1.0 L/h.
Cathode Anode Current
density
(mA/cm
2
)
TOC
removal
(%)
Resistivity (mV)
Cathode Anode
Al rod Al rod 31.98 54.65 0.3572 0.4402
Al rod Al rod 12.79 49.89 0.2697 0.2964
Al rod Al rod 6.40 38.43 0.2647 0.2834
Al rod
(hexagonal)
Al rod
(hexagonal)
12.79 50.72 0.3409 0.3425
SS rod Al rod 12.79 68.37
Fig. 3. Scaling of aluminum electrodes of different geometries after 6 h of
electrolysis.
N. Lakshmi Kruthika et al. / Journal of Environmental Chemical Engineering 1 (2013) 183188 185
words, the rate of Al
3+
dissolution is less than the rate of diffusion
of dissolved Ca
2+
and Cl

to the electrode surface. Hence, the

dissolved ions from the solution are deposited on the electrode
surface. It clearly suggests that the performance of the electrodes
will be drastically affected at high concentration of dissolved ions.
Since Ca
2+
was found to be responsible for scaling, the same was
precipitated using bicarbonate. The precipitation of CaCO
3
can be
represented as
2NaHCO
3
CaCl
2
! 2NaCl CaCO
3
CO
2
H
2
O (6)
The supernatant liquid was collected in bulk and the Ca
2+
was
found to be decreased to 0.09 M. This wastewater was used for
further electrocoagulation tests.
Effect of applied current density
Current density is the key design parameter that has direct
bearing on electrical energy of the process. The effect of current
density on TOC removal was studied at three different applied
current densities viz. 12.6, 22.39 and 31.98 mA cm
2
at a ow rate
of 1.0 L/h. All the experiments were conducted using SS 316 as
cathode and Al as anode. Samples were collected at regular
intervals over a period of 24 h and the results obtained are plotted
in Fig. 4. From the results, it is apparent that the inuence of
applied current density on TOC removal was observed only at
initial stage. The difference is very marginal beyond 10 h
electrolysis. In all the cases, the maximum removal was observed
to be around 65%. It is known that the power consumption is
proportional to applied current density. The power consumption
was estimated to be 0.63 Wh/L, 1.64 Wh/L, 2.44 Wh/L for current
densities of 12.6, 22.39 and 31.98 mA cm
2
respectively. Hence the
current density was limited to 12.6 mA cm
2
.
Effect of ow rate
Electrocoagulation experiments were conducted at different
ow rates corresponding to the retention times of 3600, 720 and
513 s and at a constant current density of 12.6 mA cm
2
. The TOC
removal as a function of ow rate is presented in Fig. 5. The TOC
removal was observed to be 65%, 41% and 37% at the respective
ow rates of 1.0 L/h, 5.0 L/h and 7.0 L/h. The decrease in removal
with increasing ow rate could be interpreted due to less residence
time and thereby less coagulant dosage. Though the removal
percentage is nearly half at the ow rate of 7.0 L/h, the energy
consumption is drastically reduced from 0.63 Wh/L to 0.09 Wh/L.
Since the removal of TOC at higher ow rate is only partial, the
efuent was subjected to electrooxidation in the second stage.
Conventional coagulation
The effectiveness of some commercially available coagulants
procured from EAU chemical manufacturing company was also
attempted. The TOC removal at different coagulant dosages was
studied and the results were tabulated in Table 3. The results
suggest that maximum TOC removal of 50% could be achieved by
using commercial coagulants. However, the turbidity of wastewa-
ter could not be reduced.
Electrooxidation
Electrooxidation is an effective method for degradation of
organic pollutants. Stable electrode materials like Ti/IrO
2
Ta
2
O
5
and TiO
2
nanotubes grown on titanium sheet (TiO
2
NT) were tried
as electrodes. TiO
2
is n-type semiconductor with a band gap of
0 5 10 15 20 25
0
20
40
60
T
O
C

r
e
m
o
v
a
l

%
Time (h)
12.6 mAcm
-2
22.39 mAcm
-2
31.98 mAcm
-2
Fig. 4. Effect of current density on TOC removal (ow rate: 1.0 L/h, cathode: SS 316,
anode: aluminum).
0 5 10 15 20 25
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
Flow rate
T
O
C

r
e
m
o
v
a
l

%
Time (h)
1 L/h
5 L/h
7 L/h
Fig. 5. Effect of ow rate/residence time on TOC removal (current density:
12.6 mA cm
2
).
Table 3
Effect of some commercial coagulants on TOC removal.
S. no. Coagulant Coagulant
dosage (ppm)
TOC (ppm)
after coagulation
% TOC
removal
1 P 2895 5 90.4 53.4
10 97.7 49.7
15 97.0 50.0
2 P 5340 5 94.3 51.4
10 101.6 47.6
15 113.8 41.4
3 P 2910 5 96.7 50.2
10 94.5 51.3
15 94.3 51.4
4 P 5001 5 109.8 43.4
10 112.3 42.1
15 114.0 41.2
5 P 5003 5 102.4 47.2
10 100. 7 48.1
15 100.6 48.2
6 P 5005 5 92.8 52.2
10 92.3 52.4
15 91.9 52.6
7 P 5009 5 98.0 49.5
10 98.1 49.4
15 97.5 49.8
N. Lakshmi Kruthika et al. / Journal of Environmental Chemical Engineering 1 (2013) 183188 186
3.2 eV. Depending on its crystal structure and the nature of
titanium, it varies from 3.2 to 3.5 eV. Furthermore, the material is
corrosion resistant, biocompatible, non-toxic and self-cleaning.
Effect of electrode material
The oxidation of the organics present in the wastewater was
studied using TiO
2
NT and Ti/IrO
2
Ta
2
O
5
electrodes separately at
an applied current density of 12.5 mA cm
2
. The results shown in
Fig. 6 clearly indicate that the oxidation of the efuent in the
presence of TiO
2
NT electrode is better. Around 80% of the organic
matter was eliminated in the presence of TiO
2
NT electrode while it
is hardly around 58% with Ti/IrO
2
Ta
2
O
5
electrode. The concen-
tration of chloride ion was measured during electrooxidation and
found to be decreased to 30,450 ppm from its initial concentration
of 34,083 ppm. This indicates the anodic discharge of chlorine as
represented below
2Cl

! Cl
2
2e

(7)
Since the experiments were conducted around neutral pH,
entire chlorine is expected to be in the form of HOCl and OCl

species whose solubility is high in aqueous solution [18]. The

oxidation of pollutants may also occur by oxidation of chloride
involving active chlorine (HOCl and OCl

).
Cl
2
aq H
2
O ! HOCl H

Cl

(8)
It is known that the oxidation of organics in the presence of
active and dimensionally stable anodes like IrO
2
/TaO
2
/RuO
2
coated titanium was attributed to the formation of higher oxides
[19] via adsorption of hydroxyl/oxy chloride radical which can be
represented as
MO
x
OH

! MO
x
OH

! MO
x1
H

(9)
MO
x
OCl

! MO
x
OCl

Cl

! MO
x1
Cl
2
e

(10)
In the presence of oxidizable organics, the chemisorbed active
oxygen will participate in the formation of selective oxidation
products where as physisorbed active oxygen leads to complete
degradation to CO
2
and H
2
O [20]. Serikawa et al. [21] have
observed strong catalytic effect while converting organic pollu-
tants to innocuous CO
2
and H
2
O in the presence of chloride ion. It
is also apparent that the indirect electrooxidation involving
various forms of chlorine was a predominant process in removing
organic pollutants. Consequently, the oxidation of efuent is poor
under Ti/IrO
2
Ta
2
O
5
electrode. Better oxidation by TiO
2
NT
electrode may be attributed to the difference in band gap and
specic surface area. It is evident that the TiO
2
nanotues grown on
Ti-surface are intact and active even after prolonged usage for
several hours. The SEMEDAX analysis of the electrode surface
indicates the presence of minor amounts of Ca
2+
, Cl

and N. The
possibility of passive lmon the anode surface can be discounted
because of continuous generation of hypochlorite ions in aqueous
solution.
Effect of current density
The degradation of organics using TiO
2
nanotubes as anode and
at different current densities was studied and the results are
presented in Fig. 7a. From the results it is apparent that the TOC
removal was found to increase with current density that too only at
the initial stage. Also, it was observed that the TOC removal beyond
25 mA cm
2
is very marginal. In general, if the applied current is
more than the limiting current, the oxidation will be invariably
under mass transport control and the oxygen evolution dominates
the Cl

oxidation. This may be the reason for the marginal TOC

removal at higher current densities of 25 and 37.5 mA cm
2
.
0 2 4 6 8 10
0
20
40
60
80
T
O
C

r
e
m
o
v
a
l

%
Time (h)
TiO
2
NT
Ti/IrO
2
-Ta
2
O
5
Fig. 6. Effect of anode material on TOC removal (current density: 12.6 mA cm
2
).
0 2 4 6 8 10
0
20
40
60
80
b
T
O
C

r
e
m
o
v
a
l

%
Time (h)
12.5 mA/cm
2
25 mA/cm
2
37.5 mA/cm
2
0 1 2 3 4 5 6
0
50
100
150
Zero order
R
2
Current density
T
O
C

r
e
m
o
v
a
l

m
g
L
-
1
Time (h)
12.5mAcm
-2
0.9700
25.0mAcm
-2
0.9371
37.5mAcm
-2
0.9339
Fig. 7. (a) Effect of current density on TOC removal and (b) kinetics of TOC removal.
N. Lakshmi Kruthika et al. / Journal of Environmental Chemical Engineering 1 (2013) 183188 187
During the process, the concentration of Cl

was decreased from

34,083 mg/L to 30,674 mg/L indicating the discharge of chlorine at
the anode. Maximum removal of 80% is attained even at a low
current density of 12.5 mA cm
2
. The kinetic data on TOC removal
presented in Fig. 7b clearly suggests that the degradation of
organics follow zero order rate expression. This implies that
electrooxidation is current control process where the pollutant
molecules arrive at the anode faster than the electrochemical
production of oxidant.
Conclusions
The efcacy of electrochemical techniques viz. electrocoagu-
lation and electrooxidation for the treatment of wastewater
generated from gelatin production industry was studied. The
initial TOC of 194.4 ppm was reduced to 82 ppm by electro-
coagulation using aluminum and steel electrodes. However, the
performance of the electrocoagulation was drastically affected
due to formation of CaCl
2
scales over the electrodes. After
precipitation of calcium ion as calcium carbonate, the perfor-
mance of the electrodes was signicantly improved. Aluminum
electrodes of different geometry viz. cylindrical rod and
hexagonal rod were used as anode. The role of electrode
geometry on scaling was observed to be very marginal. The
energy consumption for electrocoagulation was estimated to be
0.09 Wh/L. Coagulation by commercial coagulants was also tried
and found to be less effective compared to electrocoagulation.
After processing the wastewater by electrocoagulation, the
processed wastewater was subjected to electrooxidation for
further purication. Among the electrodes tried as anode, TiO
2
NT (TiO
2
nanotubes grown on titanium) was found to be better
compared to Ti/IrO
2
Ta
2
O
5
. The decrease in TOC is 58% in the
presence of IrO
2
Ta
2
O
5
coated Ti electrode whereas about 80%
was achieved using TiO
2
NT electrode. Thus the overall TOC
could be brought down to 1215 ppm from the initial value of
195 ppm. The study indicates that the combination of electro-
coagulation and electrooxidation techniques is amenable for the
treatment of wastewater generated from gelatin production
plant.
Acknowledgement
The authors are thankful to Director, CSIR-NML for permission
to publish this work.
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