Journal of Molecular Structure, cilt.1277, 2023 (SCI-Expanded)
© 2022In this study, Acid Orange 7 (AO7) removal from synthetic water by advanced oxidation processes was investigated. Within the scope of the study, individual and different integrated applications of Fenton reaction, photooxidation and sonication were examined. The effects of variables such as H2O2, Fe2+, reaction time, pH and initial dye concentration on the removal performance were investigated. Three different UV light sources, namely UV-A, UV-B and UV-C, were used. In order to study the effect of ultrasound addition, ultrasound with a frequency of 40 kHz and a power of 180 W was used. Effective AO7 degradation was achieved by Fenton oxidation at optimum conditions of 100 mg L−1 H2O2, 25 mg L−1 Fe2+, 100 mg L−1 dye concentration, 3 pH and 30 min. The removal efficiency of the Fenton process was 97.6%, while it was for Fenton/UV-A, UV-B and UV-C light 97.6%, 96.97% and 97.35%, respectively. In the Fenton/US/UV process with ultrasound addition, removal efficiencies of 97.45%, 97.52% and 95.95% were obtained in UV-A, UV-B and UV-C lights, respectively. In Fenton/US process, the removal efficiency was 96.35%. In addition, in the kinetic study, it was determined that each process complied with the zeroth-order kinetics with the highest R2 values. This study is especially important in terms of demonstrating the synergistic effect of these processes in an integrated reactor. Moreover, in such studies, the chemical reactivity analysis of the studied dye is quite important. For this aim, Density Functional Theory (DFT) calculations were performed. The study showed that Fenton processes can be used as an efficient and reliable method for AO7 removal. In this study, the experimental results for AO7 degradation were supported by theoretical calculations.