• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.34 no.5
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• pp.345-356
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• 2020

The removal of organic carbon and nutrients (i.e. N and P) from wastewater is essential for the protection of the water environment. Especially, nitrogen compounds cause eutrophication in the water environment, resulting in bad water quality. Conventional nitrogen removal systems require high aeration costs and additional organic carbon. Microbial electrochemical system (MES) is a sustainable environmental system that treats wastewater and produces energy or valuable chemicals by using microbial electrochemical reaction. Innovative and cost-effective nitrogen removal is feasible by using MESs and increasing attention has been given to the MES development. In this review, recent trends of MESs for nitrogen removal and their mechanism were conclusively reviewed and future research outlooks were also introduced.

• Journal of Electrochemical Science and Technology
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.261-268
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• 2022

In this study, electrochemical treatment of urban wastewater with electrical conductivity of 1000 μS cm^-1 and chemical oxygen demand of 250 mg L^-1 was investigated using the variables of initial pH value, current density and flow rate. Electrocoagulation was used, in which aluminum and stainless steel were selected, as the electrochemical treatment process. The electrocoagulation process was operated in continuous mode. The data obtained in experimental studies show that the best COD removal efficiency occurred in experiments where the initial pH value was 6. The increase in current density from 5 A to 15 A decreased the removal efficiency from 79 to 67%. The increase in flow rate under constant current density also reduced the efficiency of removal as expected. In experiments in which current density and flow rate were examined together, the increase in flow rate allowed the application of higher current densities. This situation led to considerable reductions in energy consumption values, even if the COD removal efficiency did not significantly increase. The high COD removal obtained with the use of high flow rate and high current density indicates that the electrocoagulation process can be used for high flow rate municipal wastewater treatment.

• Tribology and Lubricants
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.79-85
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• 2015

RC delay is a critical issue for achieving high performance of ULSI devices. In order to minimize the RC delay time, we uses the CMP process to introduce high-conductivity Cu and low-k materials on the damascene. The low-k materials are generally soft and fragile, resulting in structure collapse during the conventional high-pressure CMP process. One troubleshooting method is electrochemical mechanical polishing (ECMP) which has the advantages of high removal rate, and low polishing pressure, resulting in a well-polished surface because of high removal rate, low polishing pressure, and well-polished surface, due to the electrochemical acceleration of the copper dissolution. This study analyzes an electrochemical state (active, passive, transpassive state) on a potentiodynamic curve using a three-electrode cell consisting of a working electrode (WE), counter electrode (CE), and reference electrode (RE) in a potentiostat to verify an electrochemical removal mechanism. This study also tries to find optimum conditions for ECMP through experimentation. Furthermore, during the low-pressure ECMP process, we investigate the effect of current density on surface roughness and removal rate through anodic oxidation, dissolution, and reaction with a chelating agent. In addition, according to the Faraday’s law, as the current density increases, the amount of oxidized and dissolved copper increases. Finally, we confirm that the surface roughness improves with polishing time, and the current decreases in this process.

• Journal of Electrochemical Science and Technology
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.44-49
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• 2012

Electrochemical and photochemical techniques have been proved to be effective for the removal of organic pollutants in textile wastewater. The present study deals with degradation of synthetic textile effluents containing reactive dyes and assisting chemicals, using electro oxidation and photo catalytic treatment. The influence of various operating parameters such as dye concentration, current density, supporting electrolyte concentration and lamp intensity on TOC removal has been determined. From the present investigation it has been observed that nearly 70% of TOC removal has been recorded for electrooxidation treatment with current density 5 mA/$dm^2$, supporting electrolyte concentration of 3 g/L and in photocatalytic treatment with 250 V as optimum lamp intensity nearly 67% of TOC removal was observed. The result indicates that electro oxidation treatment is more efficient than photocatalytic treatment for dye degradation.

• Journal of Surface Science and Engineering
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• v.36 no.2
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• pp.184-193
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• 2003

Cyclic sweep voltametry was performed to investigate the electrochemical behavior of heavy metal ions and the organic additives in surface finishing process. And electrolysis using parallel plate electrode electrolyzer was carried out to simulate the treatment of real waste water. Results showed that more than 99 percent of Cu was recovered and selective recovery of Cu in mixed waste water was possible, but the possibility of economical recovery of Ni and Cr were very low due to the evolution of hydrogen gas. Electrochemical oxidation of cyanide and organic additives on anode showed very excellent removal rate. The complete removal of several hundred ppm of cynide was possible within several tens minutes and organics within 2 or 3 hours. Even in case of concentrate waste water, the complete removal of COD by using NaCl and air stirring seemed to be possible.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Soil and Groundwater Environment Conference
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• 2002.04a
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• pp.34-37
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• 2002

In this study, electrochemical characteristics variation and removal efficiency with initial pH and mineral compositions during electrokinetic remediation of lead contaminated soils were investigated. Test results showed that heavy metal transportation affected by soil characteristics and electrochemical characteristics varied during electrokinetic remediation. Therefore, in the application of enhanced electrokinetic remediation technique to increase removal efficiency, discrete selection of enhanced technique with characteristics of targeted soil were needed.

• Journal of Environmental Science International
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• v.25 no.7
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• pp.905-916
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• 2016

The characteristics of phenol removal and $UV_{254}$ matters variance were investigated and compared by the variation of operating factors (NaCl concentration, air flow rate, initial phenol concentration) in electrochemical reaction (ER) and dielectric barrier discharge plasma reaction (DBDPR), respectively. The phenol removal rate was shown as $1^{st}$ order both in ER and DBDPR. Also, the absorbance of $UV_{254}$ matters which means aromatic intermediates was analyzed to investigate the complete phenol degradation process. In ER, the phenol degradation and aromatic intermediates production rates increased by the increase of NaCl concentration. However, in DBDPR, the variation of NaCl concentration had no effect on the degradation of phenol and $UV_{254}$ matters. Air flow rate had a little effect on the removal of phenol and the variation of $UV_{254}$ matters in ER. The phenol removal rate in ER was a little higher than that in DBDPR. The produced $H_2O_2$ and $O_3$ amounts in ER were 2 times and 10 times higher than those in DBDPR. The chlorine intermediates ($ClO_2$ and free chlorine) were produced in ER, however, they were not produced in DBDPR.

• Journal of Electrochemical Science and Technology
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.35-42
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• 2017

In this study, the effect of electrolyte addition on the removal of organics and nutrients in electrochemical wastewater using a copper electrode, and the characteristics of the by-product of electrolysis were investigated. The removal of organics increased significantly as shorter reaction times upon the addition of chloride ion, and most of the electrolysis reaction was completed within 20 min. The reaction rate gradually increased in proportion to the $Cl^-$/COD ratio, whereas the highest removed mass of organic matter per mass of added electrolyte was observed at a $Cl^-$/COD ratio of 1. After the addition of electrolyte, significant removal of ammoniacal nitrogen was observed as a result of the enhanced generation of oxidizers such as hypochlorite. Excellent phosphorus removal was also achieved in a very short reaction time (within 2 min) by electro-coagulation. As the electrolysis progressed, the amount of by-product increased gradually, whereas a decrease of sludge volume index was observed after the addition of electrolyte. This indicated that the settling performance of the by-products was better, and their removal would be easily achieved.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.18 no.6
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• pp.334-338
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• 2008

The purpose of this study is to characterize various electrolytes on electrochemical mechanical planarization (ECMP). The ECMP system was modified from conventional CMP system to measure the potentiodynamic curve and removal rate of Cu. The potentiodynamic curves were measured in static and dynamic states in investigated electrolytes using a potentiostat for the evaluation of the polishing behavior on ECMP. KOH (alkaline) and $NaNO_3$ (salt) were selected as electrolytes which have high conductivity. In static and dynamic states, the corrosion potential decreased and the corrosion current increased as a function of the electrolyte concentration. But, the electrochemical reaction was prevented by mechanical polishing effect in the dynamic state. The static etch and removal rate were measured as functions of concentration and applied voltage. When $NaNO_3$ was used, the dissolution was much faster than that of KOH. It was concluded that the removal rate was strongly depended on electrochemical dissolution. The removal rate increased up to 350 nm/min in $NaNO_3$ based electrolyte.

• Environmental Engineering Research
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.443-448
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• 2019

The present study was conducted to compare the voltage generation in two-chamber microbial fuel cells (MFCs) with a biocathode where nitrate and oxygen are used as a terminal electron acceptors (TEA) and to investigate the nitrogen removal and the electrochemical characteristics depending on the separators of the MFCs for denitrification. The maximum power density in a biocathode MFC using an anion exchange membrane (AEM) was approximately 40% lower with the use of nitrate as a TEA than when using oxygen. The MFC for denitrification using an AEM allows acetate ($CH_3COO^-$) as a substrate and nitrate ($NO_3{^-}$) as a TEA to be transported to the opposite sides of the chamber through the AEM. Therefore, heterotrophic denitrification and electrochemical denitrification occurred simultaneously at the anode and the cathode, resulting in a higher COD and nitrate removal rate and a lower maximum power density. The MFC for the denitrification using a cation exchange membrane (CEM) does not allow the transport of acetate and nitrate. Therefore, as oxidation of organics and electrochemical denitrification occurred at the anode and at the cathode, respectively, the MFC using a CEM showed a higher coulomb efficiency, a lower COD and nitrate removal rate in comparison with the MFC using an AEM.