A study of an electrochemical process for the removal of phosphate, fluoride and ammonia from an industrial waste water

Unfortunately, not until recently has any appreciable emphasis been placed on restricting inorganic contaminants from our fresh waters and estuaries. Since a large percentage of these inorganic contaminants, mainly phosphorus, fluoride and ammonia, found in waste water is not removed by conventional treatment processes, advanced waste water methods must be applied to the problem of removing these compounds. The principals of electrochemical removal of phosphate and ammonia have been applied to the treatment of domestic waste water. However, the application of this electrochemical principal for combined phosphate and fluoride removal from industrial waste water containing large quantities of both magnesium and calcium ions was not investigated. Thus, the purpose of this study will be to investigate the possibility of combined phosphate, fluoride, and ammonia nitrogen removal from contaminated sea water used for industrial cooling utilizing electrochemical treatment. The results of this study show that effluent phosphate and fluoride can be reduced to 0.6 mg/l and 8 mg/l respectively. However, the removal of ammonia nitrogen from the effluent was not significantly reduced by this electrochemical treatment. Also, the effluent phosphate and fluoride concentration is not dependent on the influent phosphate and fluoride concentration, provided sufficient calcium, magnesium or iron is available for complete precipitation, but is a function of either the coulombs or watt hours utilized during treatment.