A method of processing off gas from a chemical plant, where the off gas includes carbon dioxide and water. The processing of the off gas involves separating the off gas into a gas phase and a liquid phase and using one or more ion-exchange resin bed(s) and one or more granular activated carbon bed(s) to separate unwanted organic materials from the liquid phase. Based on this separation, water can be recovered that has less than 10 wt. % of the unwanted organic compounds originally in the liquid phase of the off gas.