Optimizing the Removal of Reactive Yellow 147 Using Magnetic photocatalyst Fe3O4@SiO2@TiO2 by Response Surface Methodology in Central Composite Design

Background and Due to the poor performance of industrial dye settings about 50% of the washing dye liquor is discharged into the environment. Inappropriate discharge of dye-containing effluents is undesirable because of their color, resistance to biological treatment systems, toxic, and their carcinogenic or mutagenic nature to life forms. In the present study we investigated the photocatalytic degradation of reactive yellow 147 using magnetic Fe3O4@SiO2@TiO2.
A central composite design (CCD) under response surface methodology (RSM) was employed to study the interaction between some parameters, including photocatalyst dose, solution pH, and temperature in order to optimize the removal condition of Reactive Yellow 147 via photocatalytic process. Therefore, 20 tests were designed in Design Expert Software (version 7.0.0). All of these Factors were classified in 5 levels α, , 0, -1, -α.
There was an increase in removal efficiency with increase in the photocatalyst dosage of Fe3O4@SiO2@TiO2 and with decrease in the temperature. Under acidic conditions, the photocatalytic process was more efficient than that under alkaline conditions. The results also indicated that the application of RSM method not only helped to find the optimum levels of experimental parameters, but also proved that the role of initial pH of the solution and temperature were much more dominant than that of photocatalyst dosage in the photodegradation Reactive Yellow 147 under UV light exposure.
Current study showed that photocatalytic process with optimization of effective operational factors, is highly efficient in removal of Reactive Yellow 147. The regenerated as-synthesized photocatalyst shows high stability and high efficiency in the degradation of Reactive Yellow 147 even after ten times of successive reuse without a significant drop in removal efficiency which makes this process economical.