Cork boiling wastewater treatment and reuse through combination of advanced oxidation technologies

• Published in: Environmental science and pollution research international Vol. 24; no. 7; pp. 6317 - 6328
• Main Authors: Ponce-Robles, L., Miralles-Cuevas, S., Oller, I., Agüera, A., Trinidad-Lozano, M. J., Yuste, F. J., Malato, S.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Berlin/Heidelberg Springer Berlin Heidelberg 01.03.2017; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Acute toxicity; AOPs: Recent Advances to Overcome Barriers in the Treatment of Water; Aquatic Pollution; Atmospheric Protection/Air Quality Control/Air Pollution; Biodegradation; Biological treatment; Chemical oxygen demand; Chlorides - chemistry; Chronic toxicity; Consumption; Earth and Environmental Science; Ecotoxicology; Environment; Environmental Chemistry; Environmental Health; Environmental science; Ferric Compounds - chemistry; Forest products; Hydrogen Peroxide - chemistry; Industrial Waste; Mineralization; Nanofiltration; Nanotechnology; Oxidation; Oxidation-Reduction; Ozonation; Ozone - chemistry; Pesticides; Photocatalysis; Recycling - methods; Studies; Toxicity; Turbidity; Waste Water - chemistry; Waste Water Technology; Wastewater and Air; Wastewater reuse; Wastewater treatment; Water Management; Water Pollutants, Chemical - chemistry; Water Pollutants, Chemical - toxicity; Water Pollution Control; Water Purification - methods; Water reuse; Water treatment; Nanofiltration; Chronic toxicity; Cork boiling wastewater; Ozonation; Liquid chromatography; Mass spectrometer; Solar photo-Fenton
• ISSN: 0944-1344; 1614-7499
• DOI: 10.1007/s11356-016-7274-0

Industrial preparation of cork consists of its immersion for approximately 1 hour in boiling water. The use of herbicides and pesticides in oak tree forests leads to absorption of these compounds by cork; thus, after boiling process, they are present in wastewater. Cork boiling wastewater shows low biodegradability and high acute toxicity involving partial inhibition of their biodegradation when conventional biological treatment is applied. In this work, a treatment line strategy based on the combination of advanced physicochemical technologies is proposed. The final objective is the reuse of wastewater in the cork boiling process; thus, reducing consumption of fresh water in the industrial process itself. Coagulation pre-treatment with 0.5 g/L of FeCl 3 attained the highest turbidity elimination (86 %) and 29 % of DOC elimination. Similar DOC removal was attained when using 1 g/L of ECOTAN BIO (selected for ozonation tests), accompanied of 64 % of turbidity removal. Ozonation treatments showed less efficiency in the complete oxidation of cork boiling wastewater, compared to solar photo-Fenton process, under the studied conditions. Nanofiltration system was successfully employed as a final purification step with the aim of obtaining a high-quality reusable permeate stream. Monitoring of unknown compounds by LC-QTOF-MS allowed the qualitative evaluation of the whole process. Acute and chronic toxicity as well as biodegradability assays were performed throughout the whole proposed treatment line.