title: Optimization of electrocoagulation process to treat grey wastewater in batch mode using response surface methodology.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Discharge of grey wastewater into the ecological system causes the negative impact effect on receiving water bodies.
  
  
  METHODS
  In this present study, electrocoagulation process (EC) was investigated to treat grey wastewater under different operating conditions such as initial pH (4-8), current density (10-30 mA/cm2), electrode distance (4-6 cm) and electrolysis time (5-25 min) by using stainless steel (SS) anode in batch mode. Four factors with five levels Box-Behnken response surface design (BBD) was employed to optimize and investigate the effect of process variables on the responses such as total solids (TS), chemical oxygen demand (COD) and fecal coliform (FC) removal.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The process variables showed significant effect on the electrocoagulation treatment process. The results were analyzed by Pareto analysis of variance (ANOVA) and second order polynomial models were developed in order to study the electrocoagulation process statistically. The optimal operating conditions were found to be: initial pH of 7, current density of 20 mA/cm2, electrode distance of 5 cm and electrolysis time of 20 min.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  These results indicated that EC process can be scale up in large scale level to treat grey wastewater with high removal efficiency of TS, COD and FC.
authors.affiliation: Department of Food Technology, Kongu Engineering College, Perundurai Erode-638052, TN India.
authors.forename: Thirugnanasambandham
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Karichappan
authors.affiliation: Department of Food Technology, Kongu Engineering College, Perundurai Erode-638052, TN India.
authors.forename: Sivakumar
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Venkatachalam
authors.affiliation: Department of Food Technology, Kongu Engineering College, Perundurai Erode-638052, TN, India.
authors.forename: Prakash Maran
authors.initials: PM
authors.lastname: Jeganathan