Flow-through heterogeneous electro-Fenton based on Co-CNT/TiCT membrane for improved tetracycline removal in wide pH ranges

The heterogeneous electro-Fenton (HEF) membrane has shown great potential for the treatment of refractory organic pollutants, but there are growing demands to improve its degradation efficiency and suitability for addressing practical organic pollutant issues. Here, a novel Co-CNT/Ti 3 C 2 T X nanocomposite membrane was successfully prepared by vacuum filtration, followed by heat treatment. Different from the traditional batch reactor, a flow-through reactor with Co-CNT/Ti 3 C 2 T X membrane was designed as an electrode to make the full use of the combined synergistic effect of adsorption and electro-Fenton (EF) process for the degradation of organic pollutants. The results found that the Co-CNT/Ti 3 C 2 T X flow-through HEF system exhibited satisfactory degradation (99.0-83.2%) on tetracycline (TC) in a wide range of pH 2.0-7.0. In addition, the obtained Co-CNT/Ti 3 C 2 T X membrane possesses self-cleaning performance in long-term continuous conditions. Co-CNT/Ti 3 C 2 T X membrane can also be used to treat practical TC wastewater with complex components, tannery printing and dyeing wastewater, and wastewater with different water matrices, and their removal efficiency can reach more than 87.0%. Specially, the coupling effect could be beneficial to accelerate the degradation of pollutants in the EF process. The method provided in this work could be further expanded, making industrial usage of the HEF membrane a reality. The heterogeneous electro-Fenton (HEF) membrane has shown great potential for the treatment of refractory organic pollutants, but its degradation efficiency and applicability for addressing practical organic pollutant issues needs to be improved.