Life cycle and economic assessment of a microbubble-persulfate system for pharmaceutical removal

Advanced oxidation processes (AOPs) are widely used for micropollutant removal from water; however, their environmental burdens at the laboratory scale remain unquantified, creating uncertainty about sustainability and scale-up decisions. This concern is particularly relevant in fossil-fuelled systems, where energy- and oxidant-intensive treatments may shift environmental impacts upstream. To address this gap, the present study conducted an integrated life cycle and techno-economic assessment of a microbubble-assisted persulfate system (MB+PS+CoFe 2 O 4 ) for pharmaceutical wastewater under Indian conditions. Optimized operation (pH 3, 0.30 mM persulfate, 1 LPM O 2 flow rate) achieved 98% ciprofloxacin degradation within 30 min. A life cycle assessment (LCA) was performed using SimaPro (v10.2) in accordance with the ISO 14040/14044 standards. A gate-to-gate boundary was adopted, and the functional unit was defined as treating 1 m 3 of wastewater, achieving a ≥ 98% removal efficiency. Environmental impacts were evaluated using ReCiPe 2016 (H) and IMPACT World+ at midpoint and endpoint levels across 18 categories, including climate change, ecotoxicity, human toxicity, eutrophication, particulate matter formation, ozone depletion, and resource scarcity. The global warming potential was 1.58 × 10 –2 kg CO 2 -eq, with electricity use and persulfate production identified as the dominant hotspots. The endpoint damage indicators showed minimal aggregated impacts, supporting the techno-environmental feasibility of the system for sustainable scale-up.