Abstract

Electrokinetic remediation is an emerging technology that can be used to remove contaminants from soils or sludge by application of an electric field. Here, we investigated the effects of potential apllied, electrolysis time and electrolyte content upon electrokinetic removal of aluminum from drinking water treatment sludge using the statistical Box-Behnken Design. The analysis gave a significant model, in which the quadratic part in particular was significant, thus justifying the optimization experiments. Since there was no apparent lack of fit, the model could be considered valid and its results interpreted more thoroughly. The values of the β-coefficients, and their significance indicates that the most significant coefficients are the quadratic effects of potential applied and electrolysis time. The response surface showed an optimum predicted yield of 60.5% for a potential applied of 25 V, an electrolysis time of 72 h and 90% electrolyte content.

Authors and Affiliations