XA0101537-S4J IAEA-TECDOC-1225 Use of irradiation for chemical and microbial decontamination of water, wastewater and sludge Final report of a co-ordinated research project 1995-1999 WJ IAEA June 2001 32/ 32 PLEASE BE AWARE THAT ALL OF THE MISSING PAGES IN THIS DOCUMENT WERE ORIGINALLY BLANK The IAEA does not normally maintain stocks of reports in this series. They are however collected by the International Nuclear Information System (INIS) as non-conventional literature. Should a document be out of print, a copy on microfiche or in electronic format can be purchased from the INIS Document Delivery Services: INIS Clearinghouse International Atomic Energy Agency Wagramer Strasse 5 P.O. Box 100 A-1400 Vienna, Austria Telephone: (43) 1 2600 22880 or 22866 Fax: (43) 1 2600 29882 E-mail: chouse(@iaea.orq Orders should be accompanied by prepayment of 100 Austrian Schillings in the form of a cheque or credit card (VISA, Mastercard). More information on the INIS Document Delivery Services and a list of national document delivery services where these reports can also be ordered can be found on the INIS Web site at http://www.iaea.org/inis/dd srv.htm. The originating Section of this publication in the IAEA was: Industrial Applications and Chemistry Section International Atomic Energy Agency Wagramer Strasse 5 P.O. Box 100 A-1400 Vienna, Austria USE OF IRRADIATION FOR CHEMICAL AND MICROBIAL DECONTAMINATION OF WATER, WASTEWATER AND SLUDGE IAEA, VIENNA, 2001 IAEA-TECDOC-1225 ISSN 1011-4289 © IAEA, 2001 Printed by the IAEA in Austria June 2001 FOREWORD Water resources have been and continue to be contaminated with biologically resistant pollutants from industrial, municipal and agricultural discharges. Studies in recent years have demonstrated the effectiveness of ionizing radiation, alone or in combination with other agents such as ozone and heat, in the decomposition of refractory organic compounds in aqueous solutions and in the removal or inactivation of the pathogenic microorganisms and protozoan parasites. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has been active in recent years in drawing attention to the considerable potential of radiation technology for the cleanup of waste discharges from various industrial and municipal activities. The two international symposia on the use of radiation in the conservation of the environment organized by the IAEA in March 1992 in Karlsruhe, Germany, and in September 1997 in Zakopane, Poland, respectively, demonstrated the unique potential of radiation processing for the decontamination of water, wastewater and sludge. Following the recommendation of the Advisory Group Meeting on New Trends and Developments in Radiation Technology convened by the IAEA in Jerusalem in 1994, a co-ordinated research project (CRP) was initiated in 1995 to fill important knowledge gaps in this area. This publication describes the findings of the CRP in three subject areas: groundwater remediation, decontamination of industrial and municipal wastewater and sewage sludge hygienization. It is hoped that this publication will serve as a useful reference for all those interested in using radiation for the treatment of aqueous effluents. The IAEA wishes to thank the participants in the CRP for their valuable contributions. The IAEA officer responsible for the CRP and this publication was O. Giiven of the Division of Physical and Chemical Sciences. EDITORIAL NOTE This publication has been prepared from the original material as submitted by the authors. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of the IAEA, the governments of the nominating Member States or the nominating organizations. The use of particular designations of countries or territories does not imply any judgement by the publisher, the IAEA, as to the legal status of such countries or territories, of their authorities and institutions or of the delimitation of their boundaries. The mention of names of specific companies or products (whether or not indicated as registered) does not imply any intention to infringe proprietary rights, nor should it be construed as an endorsement or recommendation on the part of the IAEA. The authors are responsible for having obtained the necessary permission for the IAEA to reproduce, translate or use material from sources already protected by copyrights. CONTENTS SUMMARY 1 Advanced oxidation for groundwater remediation and for soil decontamination 5 P. Gehringer, H. Eschweiler The application of the electron beam process in water and wastewater treatment: Fundamental and applied studies 25 W.J. Cooper, T. Tobien Electron beam technology for purification of municipal wastewater in the aerosol flow 45 A.K. Pikaev, E.A. Podzorova, O.M. Bakhtin, S.L. Lysenko, V.A. Belyshev Application of electron beam to industrial wastewater treatment 57 B. Han, D.K Kim, J.Y. Boo, J.K. Kim, Y. Kim, W. Chung, J.S. Choi, H.J. Kang, A.K. Pikaev Electron beam wastewater treatment in Brazil 65 M.H.O. Sampa, P.R. Rela, C.L. Duarte, S.I. Borrely, H. Oikmva, E.S.R. Somessari, C.G. Silveira, F.E. Costa Gamma radiation treatment of pentachlorophenol, 2,4-dichlorophenol and 2-chlorophenol in water 87 Yongke He, Jun Liu, Man Wu The destructive degradation of some organic textile dye compounds using gamma ray irradiation 97 Abdel-Gawad A.S. Emara, A.A. Abdel-Fattah, S.E. Ebraheem, Z.I. AH, H Gad Effect of radiation on wastewater from textile industries in Ghana 121 S.A. Dogbe, G. Emi-Reynolds, G.K. Banini Radiation-induced degradation of organic pollutants in wastewater 133 A.N.M. Bagyo, W.A. Lindu, S. Sadjirun, E.K. Winarno, E. Widayat, Aryanti, H. Winarno Radiation hygienization of raw sewage sludge 147 MR. Shah, D.S. Lavale, KP. Rawat, P.G. Benny, A.K. Sharma, G.R. Dey, V. Bhave Radiation technology for sewage sludge treatment: The Argentine project 163 J.G. Graiho List of Participants 179 SUMMARY Introduction Environmental application of radiation processing has an advantage over other emerging processes in that a good understanding of the underlying chemistry is found in the radiation chemistry literature. In addition, industrially rugged electron beam accelerators, which are used for radiation processing of polymers, sterilization and many other applications, are available. The process is flexible because it is relatively pH insensitive, solutions to be processed may contain solids and could in fact be heterogeneous and the material throughput may be very high. The fundamental chemistry of irradiation of water is well understood. It is this understanding that allows for the potential implementation of radiation processing to solve existing and emerging problems related to environmental pollution, hi particular, application of radiation processing in water based systems has a solid foundation. The uniqueness of radiation processing results from the formation of three reactive species in irradiated solutions: oxidizing hydroxyl radical and the reducing radicals, hydrated electron and hydrogen atom, e~aq and H. Another unique feature is that the presence of solids does not comprise the process, thus allowing the potential application of radiation processing to sewage sludges and suspended sediments and soils. It can also be easily engineered as a unit process in a treatment system because reactions resulting in the destruction of pollutants are rapid. Another advantage of radiation processing is its capability to kill bacteria and inactivate viruses at the same time it is destroying pollutants. The CRP on "Irradiation treatment of water, wastewater and sludge" was established in order to focus the attention of appropriate technical experts in integrating the effects of ionizing radiation on refractory organic pollutants and pathogenic microorganisms and parasites in the treatment of water, wastewater and sewage sludge. It involved research institutes from 11 countries (Argentina, Austria, Brazil, China, Egypt, Ghana, India, Indonesia, the Republic of Korea, the Russian Federation and the USA). The objectives of the CRP were: — to establish optimal combination treatments utilizing ionizing radiation and other agents such as oxygen, ozone, heat, etc. for decontamination of polluted water from ground and surface reservoirs and of wastewaters and sewage sludges; — to establish the effects of dose rate on the decontamination efficiency; — to establish technological and economic parameters. Groundwater remediation To better understand the application of electron beam processing to water, the group at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington conducted fundamental studies on radiation degradation of several halogenated methanes, thioanissole and methyl tert-butyl ether, a common contaminant arising from gasoline releases in the USA. The kinetic rate constants determined are used to build kinetic models to describe the destruction of target organic compounds in aqueous solutions. The work of the group at the Austrian Research Centre Seibersdorf aimed at purifying groundwater contaminated with perchloroethylene (PCE), trichloroethylene (TCE) and some genotoxic compounds. The combination of ozone and electron beam irradiation was able to mineralize trace amounts of chloroethylene in groundwater in a single stage process without formation of any by-product to be disposed of. Experiments performed with real groundwater demonstrated that the combined ozone/electron beam (EB) irradiation process is also apt to total removal of some genotoxic compounds detected in groundwater contaminated with PCE and TCE. Additional experiments further confirmed