Experimental study of microwave-catalytic oxidative degradation of COD in livestock farming effluent by copper-loaded activated carbon

CuO/granular activated carbon (GAC) catalysts were prepared in this work and used as heterogeneous catalysts for the degradation of chemical oxygen demand (COD) in the microwave (MW)-induced H 2 O 2 catalytic oxidation process. The prepared catalysts were characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), energy dispersive X-ray spectrometry (EDS), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and N 2 adsorption-desorption techniques. The results showed that CuO was loaded on the GAC surface. Subsequently, the effects of catalyst dosage, H 2 O 2 dosage, pH, MW power, and MW irradiation time on the degradation efficiency were studied. The orthogonal experiment showed that the initial PH value had the greatest effect on COD removal rate in the microwave-assisted reaction system with CuO/GAC as catalyst.The COD was degraded quickly and efficiently by the combined method of MW/catalyst/H 2 O 2 , and the mechanism of microwave catalytic oxidation and H 2 O 2 degradation of farm wastewater COD was discussed.