CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Research Background

Malaysia is one of the developing countries that have the faster growing in industrial sectors and all these industries are not exerted from dealing with wastewater disposal. Wastewater is come from many types of industries and one of the wastes is come from textile industry. In textile manufacturing there are numerous process involved which are bleaching, rinsing, mercerizing, dyeing and finishing that produce higher amount of wastewater (Pekakis, et al., 2005).

In Malaysia the environmental impact from the textile industry is one of the major pollutant problems that need to be taken seriously. There is a high concentration of textile projects in the southern region which is Johor. Batu Pahat in Johor state is known as the textile city of Malaysia with 40% of the textile factories located there especially the wet processing plants. About 15 of the 40 plants are located in Batu Pahat. Besides being an important contributor to the economy, it also a major source of liquid, solid and also gaseous wastes that consists wide range of chemicals and dyestuffs that came from dyeing and finishing processes (Mahdi, et al., 2007). It is expected that almost 15% of the dyestuffs is lost during synthesis and processing and this loss is found in the wastewater because of incomplete exhaustion (Pekakis, et al., 2005).

Textile wastewater can be characterized with many different measurements and most typical is the higher amount of colour contain from the dye (Pekakis, et al., 2005). Another typical characteristic of textile wastewater are pH, Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD), Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD), Dissolved Solid (DS) and Suspended Solid (SS). By using these parameters, the wastewater can be analyzed to show their pollutant level (Adel, et al., 2004).

There are several types of conventional textile wastewater treatment such as biological, chemical oxidation and adsorption methods (Onur, et al., 2010). At present, several methods have been developed to treat textile wastewater but they might not be used effectively because this wastewater has high salinity, color and non-biodegradable organics. It has been widely reported that many dye chemicals are difficult to degrade using conventional biological treatment processes (Chen, et al., 2005). Recent studies have demonstrated that photocatalyst can be used to degrade the dye compounds in the textile wastewater using semiconductor photocatalysts under UV light irradiation (Bharat, et al., 2010). This treatment method with the use of catalyst will be an alternative way from other ordinary conventional treatment methods used. There are many reasons for semiconductor photocatalyst is preferred in the treatment process which are economical, non-toxic material, having high surface area, and also having broad absorption spectra with high absorption coefficients (Chatterjee and Dasgupta, 2005).

One of the common semiconductor photocatalyst used for this type of treatment is metal oxide which is Titanium Oxide (TiO2).Comparing with other photocatalysts such as ZnO, TiO2 is almost the only material suitable for industrial use at present and also for the future. This is because TiO2 are inexpensive, chemically stable and harmless, and active under UV light irradiation (Kazuhito, et al., 2005).

The purpose of this study are to investigate the characteristics of textile wastewater before and after treatment from the degradation of dyeing from textile wastewater by using semiconductor photocatalysis in the presence of UV light irradiation

and the effects of different parameters such as catalyst loading, concentration of dye, temperature and pH to photocalytic activity.

1.2 Problem Statement

In Malaysia, one of the sources that contribute to the water pollution is coming from the textile wastewater. This waste consist a wide range of chemicals and dyestuffs from the textile industries that had been thrown into the river without any proper treatment process. In addition many dyes are hard to be decolorized and decomposed biologically due to their complex structure. It will cause the major problem to the environment that will affect the damage of aquatic life ecosystem and also human disease because river is the sources for daily routine such as drinking and cooking.

Standard release limits of textile effluent are becoming more tough in recent days that creating continuous problems for industries to comply with. The conventional treatment of wastewater containing dyestuffs includes biological oxidation, chemical oxidation and adsorption. Biological methods are generally cheap and simple to apply and are currently used to remove organics and color from dyeing and textile wastewater. However this wastewater cannot be readily degraded by conventional biological processes e.g. activated sludge process because the structure of most commercial dye compounds are generally complex and many dyes are non-biodegradable due to the chemical nature and molecular size (Kim et al., 2004). Thus there is a need for continues study and research on the waste water treatment to find new methods of treatment in order to sustain this industry.

So the research study on effectiveness of textile wastewater treatment by using photocatalysis with the presence of UV irradiation is conduct as the preferred method to treat the textile wastewater and hope it will be the alternative way for the textile industries to treat their wastewater disposal for the better environmental quality and future life.

1.3 Objectives of Research

The purpose for this research is to study the textile wastewater treatment method by using photocatalysis with the presence of UV light irradiation. The objectives are: 1. To study the characteristic of the textile wastewater from textile industries in Malaysia before and after treatment. 2. To study the effectiveness using TiO2 as photocatalyst for textile wastewater treatment with UV light irradiation and its optimum condition of temperature and pH to photocatalytic activity.

1.4 Scopes of Research The scopes of research for this topic are to study the characteristic of the textile wastewater which are pH, Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD), Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD), Total Dissolved Solid (TDS), Total Suspended Solids (TSS) and colour before and after treatment that has been selected. Another scope is to study the effectiveness using TiO2 as photocatalyst for textile wastewater treatment with UV light irradiation and its optimum condition of temperature and pH to the photocatalytic activity.