Removal of pharmaceutically active compounds from wastewater using adsorption coupled with electrochemical oxidation technology: A critical review

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

Pharmaceutical contaminants are emerging pollutants of concern that pose significant risks to humanhealth and the environment. Adsorption has become increasingly significant in recent years due to itshigh removal efficiency of non-biodegradable pharmaceutical contaminants. Adsorption process is relativelysimple and easy to operate, effectively removing pharmaceutical contaminants from wastewaterwithout incurring significant capital costs. On the other hand, electrochemical oxidation technology isone of the most critical electrochemical advanced oxidation processes (EAOPs) to degrade pharmaceuticalcompounds in wastewater. It has been proven effective in treating natural wastewater containingpharmaceutical contaminants. When combined with adsorption technology, it can improve thetechno-economic feasibility and environmental viability, especially for an industrial-scale pharmaceuticalwastewater treatment process. The challenges of treating pharmaceutical residues in complexwastewater are due to its resistance to biodegradation in conventional wastewater treatment plants.
However, the benefits of combining multiple treatment processes can lead to high removal efficiencyof pharmaceutical pollutants, minimise energy consumption and eliminate the use of unnecessary chemicalreagents. Most importantly, this review emphasises the optimisation of process variables for maximisingthe degradation efficiency of pharmaceutical pollutants. Finally, the future perspectives ofcombined technologies were discussed to provide new recommendations for future research directions.