The investigation of removal performances of UV/ZnO, UV/ZnO/H2O2 and UV/ZnO/O3 processes in the degradation of Butoben and Phenylmethyl ester from aqueous solution

Abstract The present study was aimed to compare the removal performances of UV/ZnO, UV/ZnO/H2O2 and UV/ZnO/O3 in the degradation of Butoben and Phenylmethyl ester from aqueous solutions. To this purpose, the experiments were done by UV/ZnO process and the synergistic influences of H2O2 and O3 in the improvement of UV/ZnO performance were studied. 38.12 % of Butoben degradation and 23 % of Phenylmethyl ester degradation were obtained when UV/ZnO process was applied alone. The complete degradation of the both pollutant was achieved when H2O2 was added in the reaction environment of UV/ZnO. Also the of Butoben and Phenylmethyl ester removal performances were increased to 96 % when O3 (as a synergistic agent) was added in the reaction environment of UV/ZnO. The higher robs (mg L−1 min) and the lower energy consumption (kWh m−3) values were observed for UV/ZnO process in the presence of H2O2 or O3. Although, adding of the O3 or H2O2 in the reaction environment of UV/ZnO, was not resulted to the significant mineralization. Therefore, the obtained results indicated, UV/ZnO process in the presence of O3 or H2O2 (as synergistic agents) due the higher robs value, a good cost-effective and also the higher performance can be applied in the degradation of Butoben and Phenylmethyl ester.