Abstract

The present situation of rapid growth in industrialization generates complex recalcitrant pollutants that are challenging to degrade by conventional wastewater treatment processes. The new generation pollutants such as non-metals in cosmetics or household cleaning chemicals and radioactive compounds which are recalcitrant are the emerging threat to the ecosystem. The headstrong micro and macro pollutants present in wastewater are found to be very difficult to mineralize. The known chemical & biological treatments have a limited range of applicability. The conventional methods such as mechanical agitation, coagulation, filtration, sedimentation, etc. are all time and energy-consuming processes. Energy intensive processes the exploitation of emerging technologies like sonocatalysis, photocatalysis, advanced oxidation processes in combination with cavitation (either ultrasonic cavitation or hydrodynamic cavitation), new generation adsorbents such as hydrogel; photoactive compounds, and many more need to be explored individually or in combination to get the end-to-end solution on the wastewater problem. The need for the hybrid system which is technically & economically feasible for getting efficient pollutant separation from the effluents is a colossal requirement. The chapter includes a representation of some of the attempts made to develop hybrid wastewater treatment. The combination of conventional methods such as the adsorption process in assistance with cavitation and the Fenton process to improve the removal efficiency is described with case studies. The chapter includes the case studies of wastewater treatment using the individual and combined effects of all three methods for wastewater treatment. The efficiency and effectiveness of the process have been discussed followed by the future scope & potential application of the process.

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Authors (7)