ZnO rod-ACF was prepared by a method involving a microwave within only 3 min. ZnO rods (average diameter of 0.3–0.5 μm, length of 1.0–1.5 μm) were grown on ACF. 99% of tetracycline was degraded and 90.7% TOC was removed within 1 h under UV light. ZnO rod-ACF achieved high performances even after three cycles of uses.