1. Degradation of naphthenic acid model compounds in aqueous solution by UV activated persulfate: Influencing factors, kinetics and reaction mechanisms.
- Author
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Fang, Zhi, Chelme-Ayala, Pamela, Shi, Quan, Xu, Chunming, and Gamal El-Din, Mohamed
- Subjects
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NAPHTHENIC acids , *OIL sands , *PERSULFATES , *HYDROXYL group , *AQUEOUS solutions - Abstract
Abstract Naphthenic acids (NAs) are one of the constituents of concerns in oil sands process water (OSPW) because of their persistence and recalcitrance. Herein, we investigated the degradation of five model NA compounds by UV-activated persulfate (UV/persulfate) process under medium-pressure UV lamp irradiation at pH 8.0. UV/persulfate process showed higher degradation efficiency towards cyclohexanoic acid (CHA) compared to UV/H 2 O 2 process under the same experimental conditions. CHA (0.39 mM) was completely removed within 30 min when 2 mM persulfate was used as oxidant, while more than 60 min were needed for the UV/H 2 O 2 process. The removal of CHA decreased from 100% to 10% when 300 mM tert-butyl alcohol (TBA) was used as the scavenger, indicating that hydroxyl radical (OH) was responsible for the CHA degradation in the UV/persulfate process. Sulfate (SO 4 −) radicals reacted slowly with CHA in the UV/persulfate process with a second-order rate constant of k = 5.3 × 107 M−1s−1. Relative kinetics studies using binary mixtures of model NA compounds showed similar structure-reactivity to that under UV/H 2 O 2 process. NAs with long carbon chain, cyclic ring, and aromatic ring were more reactive in the UV/persulfate process. The presence of high concentration of chloride ions dramatically inhibited the reaction. The OH radicals in the UV/persulfate process were generated by capturing OH− in solutions, as evidenced by the decrease of the pH value from 8.0 to 2.8 before and after treatment, respectively, in a pure water matrix. Primary intermediate products (oxy-CHA, hydroxyl-CHA, and dihydroxyl-CHA) of UV/persulfate process were confirmed by UPLC-MS. Highlights • UV activated persulfate oxidation process was used for the degradation of model NAs. • SO 4 − radical reacted slowly with CHA in UV/persulfate process compared to BA. • OH generated from SO 4 − and OH− were the main radicals responsible for the CHA removal. • Relative kinetics of model NA compounds in UV/persulfate process were studied. • The presence of chlorine ions was adverse to CHA removal and related chlorinated by-products were formed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2018
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