Electrochemical preparation and characterization of polyaniline enhanced electrodes: An application for the removal of cadmium metals in industrial wastewater

Highlights: - A simple, efficient way of recovering water. - Supply a cheaper electrochemical process. - Highly eliminates cadmium ion from industrial wastewater. - Ideal for small companies or developing countries. In recent years, the shortage of water resources has become a serious threat to human and living creatures. Water shortages were caused by climate change, such as altered weather patterns, including droughts or floods, increased pollution, and increased human demand and overuse of water. Without the proper source of water, people encounter a lot of problems in health, hunger, education, and poverty. In this work, an electrochemical system was applied to cut the heavy metals in semiconductor processing wastewater and also was able to generate a notable volume of recovered water. Consequently, a batch system to treat each 10 L of heavily affected Cadmium ions effluent and recover 70% of those input solutions as a clean water resource was introduced. The systems are prepared with a pair of Polyaniline coated (PAC) electrodes together work under low voltage input, and yet still maintain a high removal efficiency of Cadmium at the maximum rate of 92% and produce reclaimed water over time with 5.5–6.5 L every 60 min. Parameters such as treatment temperature, initial concentration of Cadmium and other pollutants, electrolysis time, and the current efficiency of the system play a significant role during the process. The results obtained from electrode material analysis confirm the successfully preparing of the Polyaniline coated electrode and also describes its behavior under different working conditions. On the other hand, the efficiency of the treatment process is also carefully evaluated by examining the output effluent properties using Inductively Coupled Plasma (ICP) measurement, turbidity measurement, and total solid suspended (TSS) measurement.