Electrocoagulation in treatment of municipal wastewater– life cycle impact assessment

The purpose of this study is investigation of electrocoagulation (EC) as a treatment of municipal wastewater, integrating life cycle impact assessment (LCIA) for assessing its environmental performance of investigated treatment. The study evaluated the effectiveness of EC in removing physico-chemical and microbial parameters using aluminum (Al) and iron (Fe) electrodes in monopolar and bipolar modes. Bipolar arrangement of Al(−)/Al/Al/Al(+) electrodes achieved the highest removals: 70% COD, 72% BOD5 followed by complete elimination of total phosphorous, turbidity and microbial parameters. This treatment was subject to investigation of the influence of reaction time (t = 10–60 min) on removals at higher current density (CD = 3.33 mA/cm2). In order to reduce energy consumption, the same reaction time range was used with a reduced CD = 2.33 mA/cm2. Following removal efficiencies obtained: 47–72% COD (higher CD) and 53–78% (lower CD); 69–75% BOD5 (higher CD) and 55–74% CD (lower CD); 12–21% NH4− (higher CD) and 7–22% NH4− (lower CD). Total P, NO3− and NO2− compounds showed the same removals regardless the CD. Decrease in current density did not influence removals of total suspended matter, turbidity, salinity as well as microbial parameters. The bipolar arrangement of Al(−)/Al/Al/Al(+) electrodes, assuming a lower CD = 2.33 mA/cm2 and t = 30 min, was assessed with the Recipe 2016 and USEtox v.2 LCIA methods to explore the environmental justification of using EC for wastewater treatment. The LCIA results revealed that the EC process significantly reduces water eutrophication and toxicity for freshwater and marine ecosystems, but has higher impacts in global warming, fossil fuel consumption, human toxicity, acidification, and terrestrial ecotoxicity due to high energy consumption. This can be mainly explained by the assumption in the study that the EC precipitate is dispersed to agricultural soil without any pre-treatment and material recovery, along with relatively high energy consumption during the process.