| dc.description.abstract | Wastewaters generated from the textile industry contain large amounts of azo dyes
which, owning to their non-biodegradability, toxicity and potential carcinogenic nature,
constitute a major threat to the surrounding ecosystem. Environmental concerns and the need of
meeting the stringent international standards for rejecting wastewaters has made the development
of novel, efficient and low cost methods for the purification of textile aqueous effluents an issues
of major importance. ZnO-mediated solar photocatalytic has been shown to be a potentially
advantageous process as it may lead to complete mineralization at ambient conditions with the
use of solar light as the energy sources. In the present study, the photocatalytic degradation of a
model textile azo dye (Acid Orange 7, AO7) in aqueous solution is investigated with the use of
ZnO photocatalyst. The effect of various parameters such as catalyst loading (0.5 g/L – 2.5 g/L),
initial dye concentration (50 – 200 mg/L), and color removal on the degradation of dye has been
studied. The reaction pathway of dye degradation was also investigated by monitoring the final
product in solution, with the use of a technique including UV-Vis spectrophotometer. Catalyst
loading affects decolourization efficiency of Acid Orange 7 which is maximized at about 2.5 g/L
catalyst loading where colour removal was 99.8% while for effect of initial dye concentration
which is 50 mg/L, the colour removal was 92%. | en_US |
