Abstract The experimental study investigates the effectiveness of four advanced oxidation processes (AOPs)—UV alone, UV/H₂O₂, photo-Fenton, and photo-Fenton-like—for enhancing the biodegradability of cosmetic and personal care products (PCP) wastewater from an Egyptian manufacturing facility. The processes were evaluated based on COD and TOC removal efficiency, biodegradability index (BOD₅/COD), acute toxicity reduction, energy demand, operating cost, carbon footprint, and reaction kinetic. Under optimized operational conditions, the photo-Fenton process achieved the highest COD and TOC removal (98.9% and 97%, respectively), followed by photo-Fenton-like (95% and 88.7%), UV/H₂O₂ (75% and 67.4%), and UV alone (30% and 23%). The biodegradability index increased from 0.27 in untreated wastewater to 0.76, 0.72, 0.59, and 0.43 after photo-Fenton, photo-Fenton-like, UV/H₂O₂, and UV treatments, respectively. Daphnia magna bioassays confirmed a significant reduction in toxicity across all treated effluents. Kinetic analysis revealed that the photo-Fenton and photo-Fenton-like processes followed first-order degradation, while UV and UV/H₂O₂ exhibited second-order kinetics. ANOVA results demonstrated statistically significant effects of operational parameters ( p 0.93). Energy consumption was lowest for photo-Fenton (4.02 kWh/kg COD), increasing to 6.03 and 16.09 kWh/kg COD for photo-Fenton-like and UV/H₂O₂, respectively. Operating costs ranged from 2.12 USD/m 3 (photo-Fenton) to 5.64 USD/m 3 (UV/H₂O₂). Carbon footprint analysis further confirmed the environmental advantage of photo-Fenton treatment, exhibiting the lowest CO₂-equivalent emissions among the studied processes. Considering the overall technical, environmental, and economic criteria, the photo-Fenton process was identified as the most efficient and sustainable AOP for pre-treating cosmetic and PCP wastewater.
Ismail et al. (Mon,) studied this question.