Photolysis System Performance in Petroleum Hydrocarbons Removal from Wastewater and its Modeling

Water contaminated with petroleum hydrocarbons has harmful effects on health, economy and environment. In this study, photolysis process for treating petroleum hydrocarbons was investigated. Hence different initial CODs with different UV-C radiation power were examined. Based on the energy consumption per unit of COD removed, COD of 350 mg/L and radiation power of 80 W were chosen as the optimum conditions. To improve model prediction, in addition to the aforementioned CODs, COD=1000 mg/L in 60 W was also tested. The findings indicated that photolysis can be considered as a suitable pretreatment process for the biological systems.