Heterogeneous Catalytic Ozonation of Refinery Wastewater over Alumina-Supported Mn and Cu Oxides Catalyst

An economical method was proposed to develop an efficient alumina-supported manganese (Mn) and copper (Cu) oxides (Mn-Cu-O/Al2O3) catalyst with a high surface area, 184.06 cm2 g−1. The catalyst was utilized for degradation refinery wastewater by heterogeneous catalytic ozonation. The effects of various operating variables including pH, ozone and catalyst dosages, and temperature were systematically investigated in detail to obtain the optimized conditions for accelerated degradation of refinery wastewater. The optimum values were as follows: ozone dose 50.0 mg L−1, catalyst dose 3.0 g L−1, initial pH = 6.8, T = 17 °C. Refinery wastewater samples were analyzed by chemical oxygen demand (COD) and the results indicated that kinetics of COD followed a pseudo–first-order degradation. Moreover, hydroxyl radical mechanism rather than absorption was proposed, indicating that the surface hydroxyl groups were the active sites that played a significant role in catalytic ozonation.