Assessment of an electrochemical advanced oxidation system for removal of pharmaceutical compounds at the Vaudreuil-Dorion municipal wastewater treatment facility

Abstract

Municipal wastewaters contain diverse pharmaceutical products that may present long-term risks to receiving water bodies and ecosystems. We present an electrochemical advanced oxidation process called the Advanced Oxidation System (AOS) to decontaminate municipal wastewater. Results from a pilot-scale reactor at the Vaudreuil-Dorion municipal wastewater treatment facility revealed that the AOS technology, operating in continuous operation mode at a flowrate of 18.9 L min⁻¹, eliminated 79% to 98% of 9 prevalent pharmaceutical products (PPs) and promoted a mineralization rate of 49 ± 2%. We conducted a cost analysis to demonstrate this technology is an effective and low-cost tertiary treatment to remove PPs from municipal wastewater. Using analogous AOS reactors at a laboratory scale, we investigated a probable mechanism, whereby both anodic and cathodic reactions simultaneously produce reactive oxygen species such as ˙OH and H₂O₂ in the reactor to oxidize pharmaceutical products in wastewater.