The Evolving Landscape of Advanced Oxidation Processes in Wastewater Treatment: Challenges and Recent Innovations

The increasing presence of persistent pollutants in industrial wastewater underscores the shortcomings of conventional treatment methods, prompting the adoption of advanced oxidation processes (AOPs) for sustainable water remediation. This review examines the development of AOPs, focusing on their ability to produce hydroxyl radicals and reactive oxygen species (ROS) to mineralize complex pollutants. Homogeneous systems such as Fenton’s reagent show high degradation efficiency. However, challenges like pH sensitivity, catalyst recovery issues, sludge generation, and energy-intensive operations limit their scalability. Heterogeneous catalysts, such as TiO2-based photocatalysts and Fe3O4 composites, offer…