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Electro-Fenton removal of polystyrene nanoplastics from urban treated wastewater using a biodegradable iron chelating agent
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Scientists tested a new water treatment method that uses electricity and an eco-friendly iron additive to break down tiny plastic particles (nanoplastics) left over in treated wastewater, the kind regular treatment plants often miss. The method removed up to 91% of these plastic particles while using far less energy than older techniques, which matters because these microscopic plastics can end up in rivers, drinking water, and eventually our bodies. More testing on real wastewater (not just lab-made samples) is still needed before this could be used widely, but it's a promising step toward cleaner water and less plastic exposure.
Nanoplastics in urban treated wastewater represent an emerging environmental challenge due to their colloidal stability and resistance to conventional treatment processes. This work investigates the role of electrogenerated hydrogen peroxide in the degradation of polystyrene NPs in synthetic urban treated wastewater. Three electrochemical configurations were evaluated: electrochemical oxidation with cathodic H 2 O 2 electrogeneration (EO-H 2 O 2 ), electro-Fenton (EF) at acidic pH, and EF at near-neutral pH using Fe(III)-EDDS as an iron chelating agent. The carbon felt cathode achieved the highest performance in the EO-H 2 O 2 system, removing 78.75% TOC at 0.75 kWh gTOC −1 . Under acidic EF conditions, NPs adsorbed onto the CF surface, as confirmed by SEM imaging and organic carbon monitoring, complicating the assessment of true degradation efficiency. The EF-EDDS system at circumneutral pH simultaneously overcame this limitation. It achieved superior performance, with minimum NPs elimination values of 51%, 86%, and 91% at 0.1, 0.3, and 0.5 A, respectively, corresponding to TOC removals of 75.8%, 88.8%, and 91.6%. TEM analysis indicated significant structural degradation and reduction in particle abundance after treatment. The EF-EDDS system achieved specific energy consumptions of 0.10-0.87 kWh gTOC −1 , representing a reduction of up to 14-fold compared to conventional electrochemical oxidation applied to the same wastewater matrix under comparable conditions, and showing lower specific energy consumption and higher mineralization than the literature systems included in the comparison, while recognizing the differences in reactor configuration, operating conditions and wastewater composition. Validation with real wastewater effluents is nevertheless required to confirm the generalizability of these findings.
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