A comparative treatment of stabilized landfill leachate: Coagulation and activated carbon adsorption vs. electrochemical oxidation

This work investigated the treatment of a landfill leachate that had previously undergone biological treatment. Two treatment schemes were compared: the first one involved coagulation followed by activated carbon adsorption, whilst the second was electrochemical treatment. Coagulation with alum resulted in a 50% removal of chemical oxygen demand (COD). The optimum aluminium dose was 3 mM Al3+. Activated carbon adsorption of stabilized leachate that had been previously treated by coagulation resulted in an overall 80% removal of COD. However, a significant part of the organic matter (corresponding to 170 mg/L) was non-adsorbable. Electrochemical oxidation over a boron-doped diamond electrode led to about 90% COD removal in 240 min with the resulting stream having a COD content as low as 50 mg/L. An increase in current intensity from 15 A to 21 A had no practical effect on the overall COD removal, which followed first-order kinetics.