Environmental Research 214 (2022) 113890

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Environmental Research
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/envres

Can electrocoagulation technology be integrated with wastewater

treatment systems to improve treatment efficiency?
Forat Yasir AlJaberi a, Saja Mohsen Alardhi b, Shaymaa A. Ahmed c, Ali Dawood Salman d, e,
Tatjána Juzsakova d, Igor Cretescu f, Phuoc-Cuong Le g, *, W.Jin Chung h, S.Woong Chang h,
D.Duc Nguyen h, i, **
a
Chemical Engineering Department, College of Engineering, Al-Muthanna University, Al-Muthanna, Iraq
b
Nanotechnology and Advanced Materials Research Center, University of Technology, Baghdad, Iraq
c
Chemical Engineering Department, College of Engineering, University of Baghdad, Baghdad, Iraq
d
Research Group for Surfaces and Nanostructures, University of Pannonia, Veszprém, Hungary
e
Department of Chemical and Petroleum Refining Engineering, College of Oil and Gas Engineering, Basra University, Iraq
f
Department of Environmental Engineering and Management, Gheorghe Asachi Technical University of Iasi, Romania
g
The University of Danang-University of Science and Technology, 54 Nguyen Luong Bang, Danang 550000, Vietnam
h
Department of Environmental Energy Engineering, Kyonggi University, Republic of Korea
i
Faculty of Environmental and Food Engineering, Nguyen Tat Thanh University, 300A Nguyen Tat Thanh, District 4, HCM City 755414, Vietnam

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Considerable amounts of domestic and industrial wastewater that should be treated before reuse are discharged
Wastewater treatment into the environment annually. Electrocoagulation is an electrochemical technology in which electrical current is
Treatment method conducted through electrodes, it is mainly used to remove several types of wastewater pollutants, such as dyes,
Electrocoagulation process
toxic materials, oil content, chemical oxygen demand, and salinity, individually or in combination with other
Electrocoagulation technology
Hybrid wastewater systems
processes. Electrocoagulation technology used in hybrid systems along with other technologies for wastewater
treatment are reviewed in this work, and the articles reviewed herein were published from 2018 to 2021.
Electrocoagulation is widely employed in integrated systems with other electrochemical technologies or con­
ventional methods for effective removal of different pollutants with less cost and sometimes over shorter du­
rations of operation. It has also been observed that the hybrid effects besides increasing the removal efficiency
can overcome the disadvantages of using electrocoagulation alone, such as less sludge formation, high cost of
operation and increased life of the used electrodes, and stable flux of water with longer periods of operation.
More than 20 types of other technologies have been combined efficiently with electrocoagulation.

Nawarkar and Salkar, 2019). The impacts of these pollutants on human

health and the environment are hazardous, and some pollutants may
1. Introduction require special advanced oxidation treatment procedures that jeopar­
dize the efficiency of wastewater treatment.
Millions of cubic meters of polluted water are discharged every year Owing to the complexity of wastewater composition, efficient
owing to different municipal activities involving domestic and other treatments may be slowed down or become ineffective in several cases
wastewaters from commercial and industrial sources, such as petro­ without further technological developments (Devlin et al., 2019; AlJa­
chemical and petroleum processing industries (Devlin et al., 2019; beri et al., 2020a; da Silva Ribeiro et al., 2019; Xu et al., 2018).
AlJaberi et al., 2020a). These wastewaters contain several kinds of Therefore, this subject has attracted the attention of many researchers
pollutants that differ in specifications and concentrations based on their for further development of traditional treatment methods or for the use
origin. The selection and combination of wastewater treatment steps of more than one method in integrated systems to overcome the disad­
and methods are critical concerns before discharging the treated vantages of conventional methods noted in Table 1 (Xu et al., 2019;
wastewater into aquatic systems or soil (AlJaberi et al., 2020b;

* Corresponding author.
** Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: [email protected] (P.-C. Le), [email protected] (D.Duc Nguyen).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2022.113890
Received 16 February 2022; Received in revised form 22 June 2022; Accepted 9 July 2022
Available online 20 July 2022
0013-9351/© 2022 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
F.Y. AlJaberi et al. Environmental Research 214 (2022) 113890

coagulation, electrocoagulation results in slight alkalinization of the

Abbreviations wastewater and enables precise control over the process. Over the past
few decades, many studies have used electrocoagulation for removal of
EC Electrocoagulation dispersed oil particles, grease, and petroleum during treatment of
COD Chemical Oxygen Demand wastewater from the electroplating process and textile industry as well
AC Alternating Current as during drinking water treatment (Restrepo et al., 2006; Palanisamy
DC Direct Current et al., 2020).
DAF Dissolved Air Flotation The electrocoagulation process was first used in Germany in 1932 to
TDS Total Dissolved Solids reduce the biochemical oxygen demand of sewage water, and a 50%
WHO World Health Organization yield was obtained. However, this process was considered a failure
TOC Total Organic Carbon owing to the high electricity costs and necessity of changing the elec­
ECP Electro-peroxidation trodes. In 1947, this process was used in the then Soviet Union with iron
DOC Dissolved Organic Carbon electrodes for biochemical oxygen demand removal from water with a
EDTA Ethylenediamine Tetraacetic Acid yield of 70–80%. In 1958, professor Mendi from Naples University used
OFI Opuntia Ficus Indica this technique for disinfection of sewage water from coastal towns.
Electrocoagulation is mainly used to remove several types of wastewater
pollutants, such as dyes, toxic materials, oil content, COD, and salinity
(AlJaberi et al., 2020a, 2020b; Orts et al., 2020; Adamović et al., 2019;
Baiju et al., 2018; Campione et al., 2019), and this technique involves
Table 1 three distinct stages occurring in the electrocoagulation cell, namely
Disadvantages of traditional treatment methods. Stage 1: electrolytic oxidation and in-situ formation of coagulants, Stage
Treatment modes Disadvantages 2: destabilization of contaminants, emulsions, and particulates, and
Stage 3: floc formation, as shown in Fig. 1. Typically, the process in­
Chemical precipitators Extra cost for disposal of the large quantities of sludge
Membrane filtration High operating costs volves chemical equations (Eqs. 1–4) where an electric current passes
Ion exchanger Difficult to clean through the anode and cathode (AlJaberi, 2018).
Relatively expensive In Stage 1, the dissolution of the metal at the anode (e.g., aluminum)
Highly sensitive to the pH value of the wastewater
releases aluminum ions and oxygen bubbles whose quantity and sizes
Adsorption Low selectivity
Regeneration of adsorbents
are extremely dependent on several operational parameters, such as the
Wetland Requires large surface area supplied current intensity and electrode configuration connected to the
Low selectivity power supply system, in the electrocoagulation reactor (AlJaberi et al.,
2020b; AlJaberi, 2018):

AlJaberi, 2019; Nguyen et al., 2016). Chemical precipitators, membrane M(S) → Mn+
(aq) + ne
−
(1)
filtration, ion exchangers, adsorption, wetlands, and electrochemical
technologies are the most widely used treatment methods (AlJaberi, 2H2O → O2 + 4H+ + 4e− (2)
2019). Meanwhile, hydroxyl ions are produced from water molecules at the
Recently, electrochemical technologies have been developed cathode, which then react with the aluminum ions to generate electro­
because their performances are overly dependent on several parameters coagulants that work as adsorbents to remove pollutants from the
that allow efficient wastewater treatments (Mohora et al., 2018). After wastewater in Stage 2 (Emamjomeh and Sivakumar, 2009). Moreover,
much research, scientists have concluded that electrochemical methods hydrogen bubbles evolve with different sizes at the cathode, as shown
are successful innovative technologies for combating environmental below (AlJaberi et al., 2020b; AlJaberi, 2018):
contamination and removing certain pollutants from wastewater
(Nguyen et al., 2014a). The electrochemical techniques consist of 2H2O + 2e− → H2(g) + 2OH−(aq) (3)
several technologies, such as electroflotation, electro-Fenton, electro­
Mn+ +nOH− ⇔ M(OH)n (4)
dialysis, and electrooxidation (Xu et al., 2019; Sharma and Simsek,
2019; Zhang et al., 2019). These technologies depend on the use of Finally, the release of gases, i.e., hydrogen and oxygen, as tiny
electrical current during operations. Electroflotation technology elimi­
nates lightweight pollutants by the process of flotation with tiny bubbles
of hydrogen gas released by the electrodes, the quantity of these bubbles
is determined by different factors, including solution pH, applied cur­
rent, configuration and metals used for the electrodes, and electrolyte.
The treatment mechanism of the electrooxidation process is largely
dependent on mineralization of contaminants by the influence of free
radicals emitted throughout the cell and hydroxyl radicals for attacking
contaminants. Electrodialysis is often characterized as a cooperative
technology combining electricity and anionic or cationic exchange
membranes. Electrodialysis cells are composed of single stage and/or
multistage devices in batch and/or continuous modes. However,
electro-Fenton relies on the electro-generation of H2O2 catalyzed by
Fe2+ and/or Fe3+ ions in an electrochemical cell to generate active hy­
droxyl radicals. Based on the reports in literature, electrodialysis used
for salinity reduction while electroflotation and electro-Fenton are used
to eliminate organic compounds.
One of the most widely used electrochemical technologies for
wastewater treatment is electrocoagulation (AlJaberi, 2018; Nguyen
Fig. 1. Interactions occurring within an electrocoagulation cell based on the
et al., 2014b; Mohammed and AlJaberi, 2018). In contrast to chemical
three stages.

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F.Y. AlJaberi et al. Environmental Research 214 (2022) 113890

bubbles encourages the lighter pollutants from both electrodes towards

the surface of the solution, these are skimmed to eliminate the surface
layer of pollutants.
To the best of our knowledge, there are no previous reports that
provide in-depth information and comparisons of electrocoagulation in
individual and combined systems for the duration of published articles
reviewed in the present work (2018–2021). This work shows the ad­
vantages of integrating electrocoagulation with other conventional
processes to remove contaminants in wastewater. Factors that affect the
electrocoagulation process are first illustrated in the next section, fol­
lowed by a review and discussion of the studies.

2. Factors influencing electrocoagulation

There are many factors involved in the electrocoagulation process,

and some of these have a greater influence over the process (Chen, Fig. 2. Impact of pH on the formation of flocs (Chen, 2004).
2004). These factors are individually examined below:
pH is not important when the conductivity is high. For acidic waste­
2.1. Current density water, the pH after electrocoagulation may increase, but it may decrease
for alkaline wastewater. The increase of pH in acidic conditions has been
The electrical variables in the electrocoagulation process are the attributed to hydrogen reactions at the cathode, which are given by H2O
parameters that influence pollutant removal from wastewater and are +2e− , H2 + 2OH− (Ruiz, 2005).
linked to economic factors (Yilmaz et al., 2005). Conductivity is an
important parameter when presented with an acceptable value, how­ 2.3. Conductivity
ever, in some situations, high conductivity is considered a problem for
electrocoagulation because it increases current density, increases con­ The presence of NaCl increases wastewater conductivity. It has been
sumption of the electrodes, and reduces electric current efficiency. For found that chloride ions can reduce the adverse effects of ions such as
some aqueous environments, energy consumption increases propor­ HCO3− and SO4− because the presence of these ions lead to precipitation
tionately with conductivity. High energy consumption results in loss of of Ca2+ and Mg2+, produce an insoluble deposition layer on the elec­
electrical energy transformation from caloric energy, producing an in­ trodes, increasing the potential between the electrodes, and reduce
crease in the aqueous environmental temperature (AlJaberi, 2019; Ruiz, current efficiency. However, it is recommended that the electro­
2005). coagulation process be applied in systems with stable average amounts
The quantities of Al3+ and Fe2+ ions emitted by the corresponding of 20% Cl2 (Restrepo et al., 2006; Ruiz, 2005). The values of the elec­
electrodes are decided by the energy source to the electrocoagulation trical conductivity, current density, and distance between the electrodes
device. When a large value of current is used, electrical energy is affect the ohmic potential drop.
transformed into heat that heats the water. If the applied current density
is too large, the efficiency will be significantly reduced. Appropriate 2.4. Temperature
selection of the current density should thus be based on considering
other operating parameters like the pH and temperature (Ruiz, 2005). The effects of temperature on electrocoagulation have not been
Electrical energy may be supplied as alternating current (AC) or direct investigated in depth, but it has been observed that the current effi­
current (DC) to the electrochemical cell. The transition characteristics of ciency increases with temperature up to 60 ◦ C and then decreases. The
each type of current through the aqueous medium generates different increase in efficiency with temperature is attributed to the increased
responses between the plates and electrochemical wastewater treated. destruction activity of the metal oxide film from the electrode surface
When DC is supplied to the cathode, waterproofing occurs and reduces (Restrepo et al., 2006; Ruiz, 2005).
the removal efficiency (Mollah et al., 2001). The use of current and
current density for analyses may be considered the same because the 2.5. Electrode material
former represents the amount of electricity supplied to the electrodes by
the power supply, whereas the latter is equal to the applied current The electrode material affects the efficiency of the electro­
divided by the active area of the electrode used in the electrochemical coagulation reactor significantly. The cations added to a solution can be
cell. Since the numbers of ions released from the electrodes depend on calculated by the anode content. Numerous researchers have investi­
the current through them, larger active areas of electrodes result in gated the commonly used electrodes defined by Holt, such as aluminum,
larger amounts of ions released. Therefore, the configuration of the iron plates, and boron-doped diamond (Nguyen et al., 2017; Hoang
electrodes is very important, such as the shape, type of metal, and other et al., 2021; Holt, 2002; Vik et al., 1984; Novikova et al., 1982). The best
factors. results for electrocoagulation differed with the selection of either iron or
aluminum electrodes, and the consequences are dictated by the
2.2. pH following: initial concentration of the pollutant, stirring rate, and form
of the pollutant. Holt reviewed one group’s study, which explored the
The pH affects the current efficiency and metal solubility to form influence between both the size of the introduced cation and efficiency
hydroxides (Chen, 2004) (Fig. 2). The pH value of contaminated of organic waste removal (Holt, 2002). They found that the iron elec­
wastewater determines the mechanism and operational parameters. trode was more efficient owing to the size of the cation formed (10–30
Examples of this situation can be seen for arsenic removal from drinking μm for Fe3+ compared to 0.05–1 μm for Al3+). In contrast with steel,
water, with the highest percentage of arsenic removal occurring at a pH Hulser reported that electrocoagulation was greatly improved on
between 6 and 8, and the best removal of turbidity and COD in waters of aluminum surfaces, this is attributed to the higher efficiency due to
the textile industry are at a pH of 7 (Nguyen et al., 2017; Ratna Kumar in-situ generation by hydrolysis of the aluminate ion of the distributed
et al., 2004; Kobya et al., 2003). However, at neutral pH, the energy aluminum-hydroxide complexes, which is not observed with steel elec­
consumption is high because of conductivity variations. The influence of trodes (Holt, 2002; Baklan and Kolesnikova, 1996; Hülser et al., 1996).

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F.Y. AlJaberi et al. Environmental Research 214 (2022) 113890

2.6. Passivation post-water treatments have significant impacts on the performance of

the electrocoagulation reactor. The design of the electrocoagulation
Electrode passivation is one of the biggest operational concerns of process influences its operation and efficiency. The processes and pa­
electrocoagulation. The passivation of electrodes is a matter of the rameters of electrocoagulation determine its operation and effective­
longevity of the process. According to Holt, from the experimental work ness, namely.
of Adamović, Novikova, Osipenko and Pogorelyi, passivation of
aluminum electrodes has been widely documented in literature. The • Continuous versus batch operation
latter also noted that calcium carbonate and magnesium hydroxide
layers were developed at the cathode during electrocoagulation with • Reactor scale-up [32]
iron electrodes and that an oxide layer was generated at the anode
(Adamović et al., 2019; Novikova et al., 1982; Osipenko and Pogorelyi,
1977). Nikolaev studied numerous ways of measuring and/or regulating 3.2. Geometry
the passivation of electrodes, such as electrode polarity adjustment,
hydro-mechanical cleaning, mechanical electrode cleaning, and inhib­ The reactor geometry involves the operating parameters, including
iting agent application (Novikova et al., 1982). The more effective and bubble direction, flotation quality, floc formation, fluid flow regime, and
consistent approach of electrode servicing, according to these re­ mixing/settling features. The most popular method in literature includes
searchers, was to manually clean the electrodes regularly, which is a plate electrodes (aluminum or iron) and continuous activity. As the
nontrivial problem for large-scale continuous processes (Nguyen et al., water moves through the electrocoagulation cell, it is metered with
2016; Adamović et al., 2019). soluble metal ions (Weintraub et al., 1983).

2.7. Electrochemical terms 3.3. Scale-up issues

Some of the electrochemical terms are discussed below for better Setting the key scale-up parameters to describe the relationships
understanding: between laboratory and full-scale instruments is one of the cornerstones
of chemical engineering. One of the important scale-up factors is the
• The consumption of the electrode refers to the theoretical con­ surface area to volume ratio (S/V). The electrode area affects the current
sumption of the electrode metal during operation (Eq. (5)): density, cation dosing position and rate, development of bubbles, and
ItM the length of the bubble direction. Mameri, Yeddou, Lounici, Belhocine,
Electrode ​ consumption ​ (g) = (5) Grib and Bariou (Mameri et al., 1998) indicated that the ideal current
ZF
density decreases as S/V increases. The S/V ratio was, however, not
where I is the current supplied in A, Z is the number of electrochemical reported widely. Only three works are available in literature besides the
reaction electrons, t is the reaction time in s, M is the molecular weight work of Mameri, Yeddou, Lounici, Belhocine, Grib and Bariou (Mameri
of the electrode metal in g/mol (3 for Al and 2 for Fe), and F is the et al., 1998), as shown in Table 2.
Faraday constant (96,500 C/mol). To expanded the method of electrocoagulation from experimental to
industrial levels, the following dimensionless scale-up criteria have been
• The energy consumption refers to the amount of energy needed to identified (Holt, 2002):
complete the treatment process (Eq. (6)):
- Reynolds number – an indication of the fluid flow regime,
UIt
Energy ​ consumption = (6) - Froude number – an indication of buoyancy,
V
- Weber criterion – an indication of the surface tension,
where U is the voltage applied in V, and V is the volume of the polluted - Gas saturation similarity,
solution in m3. - Geometric similarity
• Current efficiency shows the ratio of theoretical to experimental
consumption, as given by Eq. (7): 4. Classification of system reactions

w1 − w2
Current ​ efficiency ​ = { }*100 (7) The reactor models for electrocoagulation can be classified as shown
theoretical ​ consumption ​ of ​ electrodes
in Fig. 3. The first significant difference between the different types and
construction is the continuous or batch system. It is clear that most
where w1 and w2 are the weights of the electrode in (g) before and after
processes are in the continuous category, with continuous wastewater
the experiments, respectively.
supply and operating under stable conditions. An essential advantage of
these reactors is that they need fixed amounts of coagulants, both ad­
3. Design issues
vantages are essential for design and operation. On the other hand,
staple applications usually work with fixed volumes of the wastewater
In the design of the reactor, the absence of understanding of the
treatment cycle but have significant disadvantages in terms of design
mechanisms of electrocoagulation have been expressed. In the design of
and operation, namely that the reactor conditions change over time. A
electrocoagulation reactors, no single empirical or systemic method has
second significant difference between the different types of reactors is
been developed over the years. Therefore, comparing the efficiencies of
the role of flotation. For the first type, namely “only with coagulation,”
reactors is challenging (Adamović et al., 2019).
the reactor does not use pollutant aggregated separation, however, the

3.1. Physical design issues

Table 2
Surface region relation to volume ratio (S/V).
Several laboratory, pilot, and large-process electrocoagulation sys­
Reference Year S/V (m2/m3)
tems have been manufactured, and the designs vary from completely
integrated units to individual reactors. Electrocoagulation may also be Osipenko and Pogorelyi, (1977) 1977 18.8
combined with many units, including microfiltration, dissolved air Novikova et al., (1982) 1982 42.5
Amosov et al., (1976) 1976 30.8
flotation (DAF), sand filtration, and electroflotation. Obviously, pre- and

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F.Y. AlJaberi et al. Environmental Research 214 (2022) 113890

Fig. 3. Electrocoagulation reactor classification.

second type of reactor integrates flotation in its design and classifies it as the press-filter type consisting of a box-shaped unit cover with an anode,
“coagulation and flotation." a cathode, and a membrane, as shown in Fig. 6. This system enables
relatively simple operation and maintenance (Restrepo et al., 2006;
5. Technology description Campione et al., 2019).
For metal removal, the rotating cylinder electrode reactor can be
An electrocoagulation reactor can consist of an electrolytic cell with used, in which the cathode rotates at the center of the cell and anode is
one anode and one cathode, which is in the most simple form, as shown fixed, as shown in Fig. 7. This configuration can increase the transfer
in Fig. 4. The anode material will electrochemically corrode by oxida­ mass of the electrodes and remove metal particles from the cathode.
tion when attached to an external power source, while the cathode will Finally, it can also be used for metal removal in the fluidized bed reactor
be exposed to passivation. However, this arrangement is not sufficient shown in Fig. 8, thus allowing an increase in the specific surface area and
for wastewater treatment since electrodes with wide surface areas are improving the process efficiency (Restrepo et al., 2006; Ruiz, 2005).
needed for a workable rate of metal dissolution. This is achieved either An electrical field is produced in the medium for a short time during
in parallel or in series connections using cells with monopolar elec­ electrocoagulation, and the scattered particles are moved to a clarifier
trodes. A simple layout of an electrocoagulation cell with a parallel wherein the mixture of water pollutants is segregated into a floating
connection of a pair of anodes and a pair of cathodes is shown in Fig. 4. layer, mineral-rich sediment, and clear water. Owing to gravitational
The arrangement of an electrocoagulation cell in parallel with force, the collated mass gradually be settled down. The clear water can
monopolar electrodes is shown in Fig. 5a. Another arrangement with be extracted by conventional methods.
monopolar electrodes in series is shown in Fig. 5b, each pair of “sacri­
ficial electrodes” is internally connected and has no interconnections 6. Advantages and disadvantages of electrocoagulation
with the outer electrodes. The arrangement of the monopolar electrodes
with cells in series is electrically similar to a single cell with many 6.1. Advantages
electrodes and interconnections. A higher potential difference is
required for a given current to flow in a series cell arrangement because i. Electrocoagulation requires simple equipment and is easy to
the cells connected in series have a higher net resistance. There are other operate under sufficient operating variables to overcome most
types of reactors for electrocoagulation, and one of the most popular is problems with regard to the conventional treatment methods.
ii. Wastewater treated by electrocoagulation produces palatable,
clear, colorless, and odorless water.
iii. Sludge formed by electrocoagulation tends to readily settle and is
easy to de-water compared to other methods.
iv. Electrocoagulation flocs are similar to chemical flocs, where the
flocs appear to be much broader, have less bound water, are
resistant to acids, are more flexible, and can be separated by
filtration more easily.
v. Compared with chemical treatments, electrocoagulation gener­
ates effluents with less total dissolved solid (TDS) content. The
low TDS level allows lower cost of water recycling if this water is
reused.
vi. The electro-coagulation approach has the advantage of elimi­
nating even the smallest colloidal particles since they are put in
motion by the applied electric field, thus promoting coagulation.
vii. The electrocoagulation method prohibits use of chemicals, so
there is no issue of neutralizing excess chemicals and no risk of
Fig. 4. Simple electrocoagulation reactor.

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F.Y. AlJaberi et al. Environmental Research 214 (2022) 113890

Fig. 5. Batch reactor for electrocoagulation: a) monopolar electrode reactor connected in parallel, b) monopolar electrode reactor connected in series.

Fig. 6. Press-filter-type reactor.

Fig. 7. Rotating cylinder electrode reactor.

Fig. 8. Fluidized bed reactor.

secondary contamination by high concentrations of added

viii. During electrolysis, the gas bubbles formed can bring the pol­
chemical substances, including the use of chemical wastewater
lutants to the top of the solution and can be accumulated, filtered,
coagulation.
and extracted more easily.

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F.Y. AlJaberi et al. Environmental Research 214 (2022) 113890

of electrocoagulation with electro-Fenton, where the removal effi­

ciencies of TOC, turbidity, and color were 97%, 100%, and 100%,
respectively. Bilińska et al. (2019) developed a hybrid system consisting
of electrocoagulation and ozonation (O3) to remediate high-salinity
textile wastewater, and the results were compared with that of ozona­
tion used alone. The results confirmed that the use of this integrated
system achieved 95% color removal efficiency within 18 min of contact
time compared to 60 min when the ozonation process was used alone.
This shows that the use of hybrid systems will improve removal with less
operation time.
Barzegar et al. (2019) examined a combined system of electro­
coagulation and ozonation technologies to enhance greywater treat­
ment. The effects of contact time, pH, current density, and ozone dosage
were studied. They achieved 85% and 70% COD and TOC removals,
respectively, after 60 min, with pH = 7, 15 mA/cm2, and 47.4 mg/L of
the operational variables using iron electrodes. Then, the system was
extended with a UV irradiation step to achieve 95% and 87% COD and
TOC removal efficiencies, respectively.
A study carried out by Ashraf et al. (2019) integrated the reverse
osmosis process used to treat coal-based steam-gas-associated water
with electrocoagulation technology to purify the highly concentrated
brine. They obtained 98.9% silica removal within a short period using
aluminum and/or iron electrodes. However, the performance was
affected by the formation of a thick coating on the electrodes, therefore,
they used polarity change to overcome this problem. Another study of a
hybrid system of electrocoagulation and reverse osmosis processes was
documented by Azerrad et al. (2019) to improve the desalination of
brine water, where higher removal of carbonate (98%), phosphate
(>99%), and dissolved organic matter (50%) were obtained using
Fig. 9. Schematic of technologies that can be combined with aluminum electrodes in contrast to results obtained in the case of iron
electrocoagulation. electrodes. They also found that the oxidation of micropollutants was
enhanced 4-fold when the integrated system was extended with an
ix. Without moving parts, the electrolytic system in the electro­ advanced oxidation process using either UVA/TiO2 or UVC/H2O2. From
coagulation cell can be operated electrically, thus needing less this, it can be concluded that the reverse osmosis integrated with elec­
servicing. trocoagulation is very effective for wastewater treatment.
x. In rural areas where electricity is not accessible, the electro­ Jose et al. (2019) integrated the electrocoagulation removal of COD,
coagulation technique may be used because a solar panel con­ TOC, TDS, and color from real wastewater with a filtration process using
nected to the module may be sufficient to perform the operation activated carbon produced from charcoal to achieve higher pollutant
(Ratna Kumar et al., 2004; Narayanan and Ganesan, 2009; removal. It was proved that the integrated system was cost effective in
Adhoum and Monser, 2004). contrast to the traditional method. Sharma and Simsek (2019) compared
xi. The operation costs are minimal compared to the conventional the treatability of wastewater from a canola oil refinery using a hybrid
process using polymers (Ratna Kumar et al., 2004). system consisting of electrocoagulation and electrooxidation against the
electro-peroxidation process. It was found that the integrated system
6.2. Disadvantages achieved higher removal efficiencies of 99% and 95% of COD and DOC,
while the electro-peroxidation removed only 77% and 86% of these
i. The “sacrificial electrodes” are dissolved into the wastewater pollutants, respectively, indicating that the integrated system was more
stream as a result of oxidation and need to be replaced regularly. effective than the electro-peroxidation process.
ii. The use of electricity may be expensive in many places. Moradi and Moussavi (2019) combined the electrocoagulation
iii. An impermeable oxide film may be formed on the cathode method with a UVC/VUV photoreactor to remove COD, total chromium
resulting in efficiency loss of the electrocoagulation unit (Cr(III)) and Cr(VI)), and sulfide from tannery wastewater. It was
(Adhoum and Monser, 2004). observed that the removal efficiencies of these pollutants were 99.52,
iv. High conductivity of the wastewater suspension is required. 100, 100, and 98.27% in the case of acidic and neutral pH solutions.
v. Gelatinous hydroxides may tend to solubilize in some cases Hasani et al. (2019) compared the performances of four processes of an
(Ratna Kumar et al., 2004; Narayanan and Ganesan, 2009). integrated system of electrocoagulation-flotation when used for humic
vi. The electrocoagulation process may require application costs. acid removal from drinking water. The effects of several technological
parameters were studied. The Taguchi design method was followed,
7. Removal of contaminants using electrocoagulation process in where the process included the following elements: DC-perforated
integrated systems electrode, DC-simple electrode, pulse current-perforated electrode, and
pulse current-simple electrode. They concluded that the pulse
The use of electrocoagulation technology in hybrid systems has current-perforated electrode process was cost effective in terms of en­
received much attention from scientists in recent years. Zazou et al. ergy and electrode consumption while providing higher pollutant
(2019) used integrated systems containing electrocoagulation and removal than other processes. These results indicated the applicability of
several types of advanced oxidation technologies, including anodic hybrid systems for treating real wastewaters produced from tanneries.
oxidation, peroxi-coagulation, and the electro-Fenton process, to treat Another hybrid system consisting of electrocoagulation and elec­
wastewater discharged from the textile industry. They found a signifi­ trooxidation was suggested by da Costa et al. (P.R.F. da Costa et al.,
cant degradation in organic contaminants when using the hybrid system 2019) to eliminate COD from wastewater produced from the initial

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F.Y. AlJaberi et al. Environmental Research 214 (2022) 113890

washing of raw cashew nuts and water used in the humidification step electrocoagulation and UVA photoelectro-Fenton processes in a com­
washing of the equipment. They achieved 80% removal efficiency with bined system to eliminate benzophenone-3 (BP-3) from municipal
the hybrid system than 51% COD removal when using the electro­ wastewater. Aluminum electrodes were used for the electrocoagulation
coagulation process alone. Tavangar et al. (2019) used a hybrid system reactor and boron-doped diamond electrodes were used for the
of electrocoagulation and nanofiltration technologies to treat real textile photoelectro-Fenton process, where total mineralization was achieved
wastewater, where they obtained higher COD and color removal effi­ under these conditions. As seen from previous works, the electro-Fenton
ciencies. The drawbacks of each process were eliminated when the process is an efficient process that can be combined with
processes were combined. electrocoagulation.
GilPavas et al. (2019) proved that the integrated system of Bashir et al. (2019) investigated the efficiency of an integrated
electrocoagulation-Fenton and electrocoagulation-photo-Fenton fol­ process involving electrocoagulation and peroxidation methods to
lowed by activated carbon adsorption was more useful to remove 76, 78, remediate wastewater discharged from palm oil mills. The effects of the
100, and 90% TOC, COD, color, and toxicity, respectively, compared to reaction time, current density, dosage of peroxide, and initial pH were
that when electrocoagulation was used alone. This hybrid system’s total studied. They noted that 100, 96.8, and 71.3% removal efficiencies were
cost did not exceed 3 USD per cubic meter of the treated solution. A achieved for TSS, color, and COD removals, respectively, after 45 min.
hybridization system of electrocoagulation-sedimentation methods was Electrocoagulation technology and electro-oxidation-reduction steps
reported by Chen et al. (2019) to purify polymer-containing sewage were used individually and jointly in a hybrid system by Ghazouani et al.
under the impacts of several parameters using the Box-Behnken method (2019) to treat real wastewater from food processing activities that
as a statistical experimental design. The results showed that 97% oil transform agricultural products into food. They found that higher
removal was possible with an applied current density of 18.9 mA/cm2, a removal efficiencies of COD, phosphates, ammonium/ammonia, and
flow rate of 5.5 L/h, and a tilt angle of 80◦ of the electrodes. These nitrates were possible depending on the system setup using these two
combinations thus improve removal with low cost of operation. treatment methods.
Jiang et al. (2019) used a hybrid system of electrocoagulation and Shamaei et al. (2018) used a combination system of electro­
separation processes to remediate oil content and turbidity from a coagulation and chemical coagulation to treat steam-assisted gravity
polymer-containing sewage. The effects of current density, contact time, drainage produced water. The Taguchi experimental method was fol­
flow rate, and tilt angles of the electrodes were investigated. The final lowed, and 39.8% TOC removal efficiency was determined after 90 min
removal efficiencies of these pollutants were 96 and 97%, respectively, using aluminum electrodes in a bipolar connection mode to the power
but they decreased with the tilt angle. Khani et al. (2019) purified olive supply. Bruguera-Casamada et al. (2019) constructed an electro­
mill wastewater using a combined system of electrocoagulation and coagulation cell connected to electro-Fenton or UVA-assisted photo­
catalytic sonoperoxone technologies, where the sonoperoxone technol­ electro-Fenton units to clean raw dairy industrial wastewater. They
ogy involves the combination of H2O2 addition, ozonation addition, and noted that 28% TOC was reduced at pH 3 when integrating the
ultrasonication. The effects of the reaction time, type of electrodes, and UVA-assisted photoelectro-Fenton process with electrocoagulation pro­
current density were investigated. The biological biodegradability index cess because the bacterial inactivation by UVA radiation had been
(BOD5/TOC) was improved by 32% compared to that of raw waste­ enhanced. The same idea was reported by Flores et al. (2018) for
water. This is an improvement in removal with a hybrid system. treating wastewater discharged from olive oil mills. They proved that
Another study investigated the integrated system of electro­ the integrated system was more effective than the individual methods,
coagulation technology and photocatalytic process with ZnO nano­ where higher TOC removal efficiency was achieved, namely 97.1% at
particles to remove COD from oily wastewater (Keramati and Ayati, 25 mA/cm2 in an acidic medium within 10 h. Dia et al. (2018) investi­
2019). They achieved 85% COD removal efficiency under the optimum gated the capacity of a hybrid electrocoagulation-biofiltration process to
operational variables, where the COD initial concentration was 1000 remove pollutants from landfill leachates (wastewaters), where the NH4
ppm. Lalwani et al. (2019) employed electrocoagulation technology and removal was over 99% and COD removal was 42%. They concluded that
photocatalytic oxidation process in a hybrid configuration to remove the efficient use of this combination of processes could treat different
TOC from drug effluents. They observed that the remediation of TOC wastewaters containing organic and inorganic contaminants.
was higher (33%) using a UV source for the photocatalytic oxidation Sardari et al. (2018b) used an electrocoagulation reactor followed by
part compared to 30% TOC removal in the case of natural sunlight as a ultrafiltration to remediate poultry processing wastewater and obtained
source. This shows the effectiveness of the photocatalytic process com­ over 85% reduction of oil and grease, fats and TSS pollutants compared
bined with electrocoagulation. to the individual methods. An integrated system of
Another integrated system consisting of electrocoagulation, forward photoperoxi-electrocoagulation was presented by Borba et al. (2018) to
osmosis, and membrane distillation was presented by (Sardari et al., remove chromium and COD from tannery industrial wastewater. The
2019) for water recovery from high-salinity wastewater produced from impacts of solution pH, reaction time, amount of peroxide, and current
shale-gas extraction units. The results showed 78 and 96% TOC and TSS density were studied for carrying out response surface methodology
removal efficiencies, respectively, under the selected operational pa­ (RSM) for optimizing the parameters where complete removal of these
rameters. The combination of electrocoagulation and forward osmosis pollutants could be achieved after 2 h. The investigation of the feasi­
was also suggested by (Sardari et al., 2018a) for the removal of TSS and bility of electrocoagulation followed by membrane distillation was
organic compounds from waters used for hydraulic fracturing, where the performed by Sardari et al. (2018a) to desalinate water produced by
results revealed the applicability of the combined system for water re­ hydraulic fracturing, and 85% TSS and organic content removal as well
covery from this type of wastewater. as stable water flux with minimal fouling was achieved over 434 h of
An innovative hybrid system of electrocoagulation and electro- experimental runs, showing the decrease in the drawbacks of the indi­
Fenton was documented by An et al. (2019) to remove cyanobacteria vidual operations of each process.
and cyanotoxins from wastewater. This integrated system increased the Adjeroud et al. (2018) used an electrocoagulation-electroflotation
TOC removal efficiency by 30% and minimized energy consumption by system to eliminate copper from simulated wastewater using
92%, which indicates the birth of advanced technology for wastewater aluminum electrodes with the aid of the Opuntia ficus indica (OFI) plant.
treatment. Guan et al. (2018) suggested combining electrocoagulation Complete copper removal was achieved within 5 min using 30 mg OFI/L
and electro-Fenton methods to remove Cu-EDTA pollutants and copper and 7.8 solution pH. Al-Malack and Al-Nowaiser (2018) employed a
ions from wastewater. It was proved that higher removal efficiency combined electrocoagulation-membrane bioreactor to remove COD, oil,
could be achieved in an acidic medium with 72.92 A/m2 current density and grease from hypersaline oilfield water. They found that the removal
and 49.4 mM of H2O2 concentration. Ye et al. (2019) used both efficiencies of these pollutants decreased with an increase in the influent

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F.Y. AlJaberi et al. Environmental Research 214 (2022) 113890

oil concentrations, which were 91 and 80% for COD and oil/grease, of the disadvantages of an individual process.
respectively. Another integrated system of electrocoagulation followed The integrated ozonation assisted electrocoagulation system was
by microfiltration was used by Changmai et al. (2018) for the used to eliminate cyanide, chemical oxygen demand (COD), biological
defluorination of polluted drinking water, where this system was able to oxygen demand (BOD), and chloride from shell industry wastewater
eliminate 92% fluoride at 15 A/m2 of current density and 7.9 pH. (DasAnweshan et al., 2021). The effects of ozone formation rate current
A new hybrid system design was devised by Sun et al. (2018) to density and analysis time were tested on the improvement of the treat­
remove humic acid from wastewater. The system combined electro­ ment process. The operation parameters were optimized, and it was
coagulation and electrooxidation in an electrochemical cell with a found that at an ozone generation rate of 1.33 mg s− 1, an ozonation time
membrane module placed between the electrodes. It was proved that of 40 min, with current density of 100 A m− 2 and electrolysis time of 30
this system could be adapted to water treatment with higher efficiency. min was adequate to decrease the pollutants to less than permissible
Ghanbari et al. (2020) used combined technologies in a hybrid system, limits. This combined system produced results of 99.8%, 94.7%, 95%,
including electrocoagulation, electrooxidation, and peroxymonosulfate and 46.5% for cyanide, COD, BOD, and chloride ion removal, respec­
to obtain higher removal efficiencies of 95, 90, 91, and 99% for COD, tively. The preliminary cost was evaluated for this combination, and it
TOC, BOD, and ammonia, respectively, from landfill leachates. Kong was comparable or even lower than that reported in literature.
et al. (2019) reported the applicability of an integrated system of elec­ The effects of pH, electrode gap, electrical charge, and suspended
trocoagulation and electro-peroxone to remediate COD from shale-gas solids in the combined electrocoagulation with electro-Fenton-like
fracturing flowback water, where 35.4% COD removal was obtained process were improved and studied using a dual-anode system to treat
at 50 mA/cm2 current density. leachate concentrate by Ding et al. (2021) as well as to evaluate the
Another combined system of electrocoagulation/flotation was used removal of organics and ammonia from municipal waste incineration
by Adamović et al. (2019) to obtain 95.5% copper removal from stations. They found that high amounts of suspended solids and less gaps
wastewater after 10 min of reaction time at 4 mA/cm2 current density. between electrodes both enhanced the removal of organic materials.
Nariyan et al. (2018) employed an integrated system consisting of They recorded that removal via the hybrid process was higher than that
chemical precipitation using lime and electrocoagulation to eliminate of the electro-Fenton-like process alone, which is also higher than the
sulfate pollutants from real wastewater. Their results revealed that the electrocoagulation process. A hybrid system that works with electro­
hybridization process is useful for reducing sulfate concentration by coagulation and the electrochemical process to treat synthetic waste­
more than 90% at 25 mA/cm2 of current density. Kumar et al. (2018) water for nitrates and phosphates was studied by Ghazouani et al.
demonstrated that the integrated system of electrocoagulation and (2020). They found that electrocoagulation alone was an inefficient
modified peroxide-coagulation processes could remove 97 and 78% process owing to the formation of ammonia as a by-product, therefore,
color and COD, respectively, from wastewater at pH 3, with 50 mM they combined electrocoagulation with the electrochemical process
peroxide and only 1 V of applied voltage. Other studies combined using boron-doped diamond, which was recorded to be a promising
electrocoagulation in hybrid systems with other technologies (Zazou method for the removal of nitrogenous compounds. This combination
et al., 2019; Medel et al., 2019) to remove pollutants from wastewaters. was found to be efficient for the removal of nitrates with low energy
Akansha et al. (2020) studied a system that combined aerated electro­ consumption per unit of removed pollutants.
coagulation (with both aluminum and iron electrodes) with phytor­ The integration of electrocoagulation with membrane filtration was
emediation to treat discharged wastewater from the dairy industry. They reported by Saad et al. (2020) to treat dyeing wastewater from the
studied the impact of electrode combination, pH, and voltage and textile industry using a nylon 6,6 nanofiber membrane. They achieved
observed COD removal of 86.4% after 2 h of an individual electro­ high removal of the dye of about 79.4% in a solution of 1000 ppm of
coagulation operation. This COD removal efficiency increased to 97% NaCl with 10 ppm celestine blue dye, while the use of the individual
when electrocoagulation was combined with phytoremediation for the electrocoagulation method achieved a dye removal of 43.2% for similar
same time of operation. Fouling metals (like calcium and strontium) and energy consumption. The treatment of real textile wastewater using the
refractory organic compound removal from industrial wastewater electrocoagulation system alone and hybrid system with electro-Fenton
treatment plant of an oil refinery was studied by Nigri et al. (2020). The (EF), anodic oxidation, and peroxicoagulation were studied in a batch
removal was achieved by a combining electrocoagulation with adsorp­ process by (Afanga et al., 2020). They found that electrocoagulation
tion using coconut husk carbon. They recorded that this combined work combined with electro-Fenton was more effective than the other com­
of two removal systems offered a treatment with high economy for both binations. They achieved COD, TOC, and TSS removal of 97%, 98%, and
time and cost compared to the individual processes. Moreover, they 98%, respectively.
reported high removal of calcium, strontium, and organic matters of When treating landfill leachate remediation through biological
88%, 72% and 52%, respectively. treatment alone is not adequate, the need for combination with another
The performances of two hybrid systems were studied by Bulca et al. process is necessary owing to the presence of many types of organic,
(2021) to compare the more effective method for reusing wastewater inorganic compounds, microorganisms, and heavy metals. Le et al.
from the textile industry. The systems were (2021) used a hybrid system of electrocoagulation (with iron
electrocoagulation-adsorption (work with rice-husk-based activated anode)-biofiltration to treat this type of leachate. They found that
carbon) and electrocoagulation-catalytic wet-air oxidation (CWAO). electrocoagulation was able to remove 70% COD and 90% nitrates at the
They found that 91% of the total organic carbon (TOC) was removed optimum operating parameters, and the next combined step of bio­
using electrocoagulation-adsorption, while a reduction of 62% was filtration could remove the remaining COD and completely remove
achieved using electrocoagulation-CWAO. They also recommended ammonia. A novel continuous flow system that combines biological As
using an additional step if the COD criteria of the irrigation water could (III) oxidation by bacteria with Fe electrocoagulation (EC), and Fe
not be met through the use of the hybrid system. The combination of (0)-based electrochemical technology was created by Roy et al. (2021)
electrocoagulation and electrochemical advanced oxidation (ECAO) for the removal of arsenic from ground water sources. It was found that
with sulfate radical to treat dyeing wastewater was studied by Chanikya this biointegrated Fe electrocoagulation system was very effective at
et al. (2021) in two arrangements (EC-ECAO, ECAO-EC). They found oxidizing and removing As(III) to accepted levels with 10 times lower
that ECAO followed by electrocoagulation was better for reduction of charge dosage in a biointegrated Fe electrocoagulation system compared
COD with 93.5% efficiency and less energy consumption compared to to individual Fe electrocoagulation, leading to less sludge formation and
electrocoagulation followed by ECAO. They also found that the sludge less energy consumption, with a removal of about 93.3%. Thus,
formed contains Fe3O4 and Fe2O3 and that the sludge formed in the two improvement in removal and limitation of the disadvantages are
processes was less than that of individual operation, this overcame one promising uses of hybrid systems.

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F.Y. AlJaberi et al. Environmental Research 214 (2022) 113890

For the treatment of shale-gas fracturing flowback water, a hybrid electrocoagulation technology’s capabilities for integration with other
system that combines electrocoagulation with E-peroxone process was technologies for removal of different types of pollutants from waste­
investigated by Wang et al. (2021) as an effective promising low-cost waters discharged from several sources. This summary shows that
method. In this study, two types of arrangements were studied, effective removal efficiency of these pollutants can be achieved with
namely electrocoagulation followed by E-peroxone and E-peroxone hybrid systems while the efficiency of pollutant removal is significantly
followed by electrocoagulation. They found that the first arrangement lower in the case of individual use of the treatment methods. Moreover,
achieved a COD removal of about 89.2% compared to 82.4% for the Fig. 8 shows the technologies combined with the electrocoagulation
second arrangement, with an enhancement factor of 1.63. They also method, as given in this paper.
recorded that E-peroxone was an efficient and space-saving electro­
chemical unit with simultaneous coagulation and enhanced OH forma­ 8. Conclusion
tion by the products of the anode and cathode.
Table 3 summarizes the studies cited in this paper to explain Electrocoagulation is one of the most widely used treatment methods

Table 3
Integrated treatment systems containing electrocoagulation technology.
No. Pollutants Removal efficiency (%) Technologies combined with Electrocoagulation Ref.

1 TOC, Turbidity, Color 97, 100, 100 Anodic oxidation, Peroxi-coagulation, Electro-Fenton Zazou et al., (2019)
2 COD, TOC 85, 70, 95, 87 Ozonation, UV irradiation Barzegar et al., (2019)
3 COD, TOC, TDS, Color >90 Filtration Jose et al., (2019)
4 COD, Cr(T), Cr(VI), sulfide 99.52, 100, 100, 98.27 UVC/VUV Moradi and Moussavi, (2019)
5 COD 80 Electro-oxidation P.R.F. da Costa et al., (2019)
6 TOC, COD, color, toxicity 76, 78, 100, 90 Fenton, Photo-Fenton, Adsorption GilPavas et al., (2019)
7 Oil 97 Sedimentation Chen et al., (2019)
8 COD 85 Photocatalytic with ZnO nanoparticles Keramati and Ayati, (2019)
9 Oil content, turbidity 96, 97 Separation process Jiang et al., (2019)
10 TOC 30 Electro-Fenton An et al., (2019)
11 Benzophenone-3 (BP-3) Higher removal UVA photoelectro-Fenton Ye et al., (2019)
12 Cu-EDTA, copper ions Higher removal Electro-Fenton Guan et al., (2018)
13 Raw dairy wastewater Significant Electro-Fenton or UVA-assisted photoelectro-Fenton Bruguera-Casamada et al.,
performance (2019)
14 NH4, COD >99, 42 ± 7 Biofiltration Dia et al., (2018)
15 Oil and grease, fats, TSS >85 Ultrafiltration Sardari et al., (2018b)
16 TSS, Organic content Higher removal Membrane distillation Sardari et al., (2018a)
17 COD, oil and grease 91, 80 Membrane bioreactor Al-Malack and Al-Nowaiser,
(2018)
18 Humic acid Higher efficiency Electrooxidation Sun et al., (2018)
19 COD 35.4 Electro-peroxone Kong et al., (2019)
20 Sulfate >90 Chemical precipitation Nariyan et al., (2018)
21 Color 95 Ozonation Bilińska et al., (2019)
22 Silica 98.9 Reverse osmosis Ashraf et al., (2019)
23 COD, Cr(T), Cr(VI), Sulfide 99.52, 100, 100, 98.27 UVC/VUV Sharma and Simsek, (2019)
24 Humic acid Higher removal Flotation Hasani et al., (2019)
25 COD, Color Higher removal Nano-filtration Tavangar et al., (2019)
26 Carbonate, phosphate, dissolved organic 98, >99, 50 Reverse osmosis, advanced oxidation Azerrad et al., (2019)
matter
27 BOD5/TOC 32 Catalytic Sonoperoxone Khani et al., (2019)
28 TOC, TSS 78, 96 Forward osmosis, membrane distillation Sardari et al., (2018c)
29 TOC 33 Photocatalytic oxidation Lalwani et al., (2019)
30 TSS, Color, COD 100, 96.8, 71.3 Peroxidation Bashir et al., (2019)
31 COD, phosphates, ammonium/ammonia, Higher removal Electro-oxidation-reduction Ghazouani et al., (2019)
nitrates
32 TOC 39.8 Chemical coagulation Shamaei et al., (2018)
33 TOC 97.1 Electro-Fenton or UVA-assisted photoelectro-Fenton Flores et al., (2018)
34 TSS and organic compounds – Osmosis Sardari et al., (2018c)
35 Chromium, COD – Photoperoxidation Borba et al., (2018)
36 Copper 100 Electroflotation Adjeroud et al., (2018)
37 Fluoride 92 Microfiltration Changmai et al., (2018)
38 COD, TOC, BOD, ammonia higher efficiency Electro-oxidation, Peroxymonosulfate Ghanbari et al., (2020)
39 Copper 95, 90, 91, 99 Flotation Adamović et al., (2019)
40 Color, COD 95.5, 97, 78 Peroxide-coagulation Kumar et al., (2018)
41 COD 97 phytoremediation treatment Akansha et al., (2020)
42 Calcium and strontium and refractory organic 88, 72, 52 Adsorption using coconut husk carbon Nigri et al., (2020)
matter
43 Total organic carbon 91, 62 Adsorption, catalytic wet air oxidation Bulca et al., (2021)
44 COD 93.5 Electrochemical advance oxidation Chanikya et al., (2021)
45 Cyanide, COD, BOD, and chloride ions 99.8, 94.7, 95, 46.5 Ozonation process DasAnweshan et al., (2021)
46 TOC 68 Electro-Fenton-like process Ding et al., (2021)
47 Phosphate and nitrate 99, 70 Electrochemical Ghazouani et al., (2020)
48 Celestine blue dye 79.4 Membrane filtration Saad et al., (2020)
49 COD, TOC, TSS 97, 98, 98 Electro-Fenton (EF), anodic oxidation (AO), Afanga et al., (2020)
peroxicoagulation (PC)
50 Nitrate and COD Almost complete Biofilteration Le et al., (2021)
removal
51 Arsenic 93.3 Biological As(III) oxidation Roy et al., (2021)
52 COD 89.2, 82.4 EC- E-peroxone, E-peroxone-EC Wang et al., (2021)

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for eliminating numerous types of pollutants from the wastewaters Akansha, J., Nidheesh, P.V., Gopinath, A., Anupama, K.V., Kumar, M.S., 2020. Treatment
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technology, namely the applicability of integration of electro­ water employing electrocoagulation-membrane bioreactor (EC-MBR) process and
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AlJaberi, F.Y., 2018. Studies of autocatalytic electrocoagulation reactor for lead removal
to overcome the disadvantages of using the treatment technologies from simulated wastewater. J. Environ. Chem. Eng. 6, 6069–6078.
individually. Electrocoagulation technology offers many advantages, AlJaberi, F.Y., 2019. Modelling current efficiency and ohmic potential drop in an
such as an uncomplicated equipment system, adaptable operation, and innovated electrocoagulation reactor. Desalination Water Treat. 164, 102–110.
AlJaberi, F.Y., Jabbar, S., Jabbar, N., 2020a. Modeling of adsorption isotherms of oil
absence of chemical substances for sedimentation and floc generation. content through the electrocoagulation treatment of real oily wastewater. In: AIP
Therefore, several recent studies from 2018 to 2021 have been reviewed Conference Proceedings. AIP Publishing LLC, 020041.
to explain this technological development. Several types of wastewaters AlJaberi, F.Y., Ahmed, S.A., Makki, H.F., 2020b. Electrocoagulation treatment of high
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conditions/operational parameters have been addressed in this review, Timoshek, V.E., Titov, I.P., 1976. Experience in local treatment of wastewaters from
which provides information on the benefits of integrated systems. It was petrochemical production. Chem. Technol. Fuels Oils 12, 850–852.
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also found that the combination of electrocoagulation with other pro­ electro-coagulation-Fenton for energy efficient cyanobacteria and cyanotoxins
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lower cost. Additionally, the concept of replacing the conventional Ashraf, S.N., Rajapakse, J., Dawes, L.A., Millar, G.J., 2019. Electrocoagulation for the
purification of highly concentrated brine produced from reverse osmosis
power supply of an electrocoagulation system with solar power is highly
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recommended. Further, the hybrid system overcomes the drawbacks of Azerrad, S.P., Isaacs, M., Dosoretz, C.G., 2019. Integrated treatment of reverse osmosis
the individual procedures when used alone, like the sludge formation brines coupling electrocoagulation with advanced oxidation processes. Chem. Eng. J.
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electrocoagulation. J. Aerosol Sci. 27, S209–S210.
Forat Yasir AlJaberi Conceptualization, Writing - original draft; Saja Barzegar, G., Wu, J., Ghanbari, F., 2019. Enhanced treatment of greywater using
Mohsen Alardhi Conceptualization, Writing - original draft; Shaymaa A. electrocoagulation/ozonation: investigation of process parameters. Process Saf.
Ahmed Methodology, Resources, Review; Ali Dawood Salman Valida­ Environ. Protect. 121, 125–132.
Bashir, M.J.K., Lim, J.H., Abu Amr, S.S., Wong, L.P., Sim, Y.L., 2019. Post treatment of
tion, Writing - review & editing; Tatjána Juzsakova Validation, Writing - palm oil mill effluent using electro-coagulation-peroxidation (ECP) technique.
review & editing; Igor Cretescu Conceptualization, Writing - original J. Clean. Prod. 208, 716–727.
draft; P. Cuong Le Supervision, Investigation, Project administration, Bilińska, L., Blus, K., Gmurek, M., Ledakowicz, S., 2019. Coupling of electrocoagulation
and ozone treatment for textile wastewater reuse. Chem. Eng. J. 358, 992–1001.
Writing - review & editing; S. Woong Chang Resources, Writing - orig­ Borba, F.H., Seibert, D., Pellenz, L., Espinoza-Quiñones, F.R., Borba, C.E., Módenes, A.N.,
inal draft; W. Jin Chung Resources, Writing – review & editing; D. Duc Bergamasco, R., 2018. Desirability function applied to the optimization of the
Nguyen Supervision, Project administration, Writing - review & editing. photoperoxi-electrocoagulation process conditions in the treatment of tannery
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Bruguera-Casamada, C., Araujo, R.M., Brillas, E., Sirés, I., 2019. Advantages of electro-
Declaration of competing interest Fenton over electrocoagulation for disinfection of dairy wastewater. Chem. Eng. J.
376, 119975.
Bulca, Ö., Palas, B., Atalay, S., Ersöz, G., 2021. Performance investigation of the hybrid
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial methods of adsorption or catalytic wet air oxidation subsequent to
interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence electrocoagulation in treatment of real textile wastewater and kinetic modelling.
the work reported in this paper. J. Water Proc. Eng. 40, 101821.
Campione, A., Cipollina, A., Bogle, I.D.L., Gurreri, L., Tamburini, A., Tedesco, M.,
Micale, G., 2019. A hierarchical model for novel schemes of electrodialysis
Acknowledgement desalination. Desalination 465, 79–93.
Changmai, M., Pasawan, M., Purkait, M.K., 2018. A hybrid method for the removal of
fluoride from drinking water: parametric study and cost estimation. Separ. Purif.
The authors would like to acknowledge support from the following Technol. 206, 140–148.
sources: 1) Hungarian GINOP-2.2.1-15-2017-00106 project: Complex Chanikya, P., Nidheesh, P.V., Babu, D.S., Gopinath, A., Kumar, M.S., 2021. Treatment of
utilization of red mud and recovery of rare earth metals from red mud, dyeing wastewater by combined sulfate radical based electrochemical advanced
oxidation and electrocoagulation processes. Separ. Purif. Technol. 254, 117570.
2) GINOP-2.3.2-15-2016-00016 project: Development of modular, mo­ Chen, G., 2004. Electrochemical technologies in wastewater treatment. Separ. Purif.
bile water treatment systems and wastewater treatment technologies, 3) Technol. 38, 11–41.
Ministry of Education and Training of Vietnam via project B2022-DNA- Chen, Y., Jiang, W., Liu, Y., Chen, M., He, Y., Edem, M.A., Wang, T., Chen, J., 2019.
Optimization of an integrated electrocoagulation/sedimentation unit for purification
04 (Dr. Phuoc-Cuong Le). The authors also wish to extend their sincere of polymer-flooding sewage. J. Electroanal. Chem. 842, 193–202.
thanks to Prof. Eric Lichtfouse, editor in chief of Environmental da Silva Ribeiro, T., Grossi, C.D., Merma, A.G., dos Santos, B.F., Torem, M.L., 2019.
Chemistry Letters, for advising, reading, and revising the earlier drafts Removal of boron from mining wastewaters by electrocoagulation method:
modelling experimental data using artificial neural networks. Miner. Eng. 131, 8–13.
of this manuscript. Das, P.P., , Anweshan, Mondal, P., Sinha, A., Biswas, P., Sarkar, S., Purkait, M.K., 2021.
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