Abstract

PHARMACEUTICAL WASTE REMOVAL FROM AQUEOUS SOLUTIONS BY ELECTRO-COAGULATION PROCESS

*Yossor R. Abdulmajeed

Abstract

This study was concerned on the removal of antibiotic (ampicillin) from water by electro-coagulation process. This work was carried out to examined the ability of electro-coagulation process with two aluminum electrodes to remove ampicillin from aqueous solutions and study the influence of different parameters such as: pH (2-10), time of reaction (6-180 min), applied voltage (5-15 V), initial ampicillin concentration (50-150 mg/L) and the distance between electrodes (0.5- 1.5cm). The concentration of ampicillin was measured by using a UVSpectrophotometer. Results showed the maximum percentage of removal was about 86% at the optimal conditions (pH=6, reaction time=120, voltage=15 V, initial concentration=50 mg/L and the distance between two electrodes=0.5 cm). The electrical energy consumption investigated with respect to the obtained results were 0.183.to 8.01 at varies parameters. Finally, according to the results obtained from this work, found that the process of electro-coagulation has the ability to effective removal to ampicillin from wastewater.

Keywords: pH (2-10), time of reaction (6-180 min), applied voltage (5-15 V), initial ampicillin concentration (50-150 mg/L) and the distance between electrodes (0.5-1.5cm).