Abstract
Water purification is a process used to enhance water quality and make it more acceptable for specific end-use. The rising increase for portable drinking water has made natural coagulant application for water purification a welcome development. Most reported researches were on the use of natural coagulants in a laboratory batch scale. Because of those above, a bench-scale laboratory study was carried out on the application of Balanites Aegyptiaca seed as a natural coagulant. The outcome showed its usefulness toward water purification. This paper reported the developed bench-scale water treatment plant's performance utilising Balanites Aegyptiaca seed stock solution and the powdered kennel as bio-coagulant. Some design equations were adopted. The treatment units considered include coagulation/flocculation, sedimentation, and filtration. The total tank design capacity was 20 litres with the overflow area's actual size for sedimentation of 7.46 litres. 0.5 Hp electric motor with a speed of 600 rpm and a speed gear drop of 120 rpm were selected. 0.0127 m pipe flow line diameter connecting the tanks with a corresponding pipe flow velocity of 0.108 m/s was obtained from the design. However, in both the coagulation, sedimentation and filtration units, the material balance obtained showed a steadiness in the material flow across sedimentation and filtration units. However, among the parameters tested in the raw turbid water, the turbid water revealed turbidity of 514 NTU, the colour of 5600 CTU, the conductivity of 276 µs/cm, pH of 7.10 and total coliform bacteria count of 85 CFU/100 mL which were above the recommended set standard of WHO and NIS. The result of the treated water using the stock solution and the powdered kennel (bio-coagulant) on the developed water treatment unit showed a remarkable reduction in the tested parameters in the raw turbid water used for the treatment process. Total coliform count reduces from 85 CFU/100 ml to 10 CFU/ml in both cases. It was observed that conductivity increases after the treatment, but other inorganic constituents reduce significantly though not to WHO and NIS's recommended set standard. The 0-dosage treatment conducted also showed a reduction in all the tested parameters.
Highlights
The water crisis is a severe issue of global concern; it has been reported by [12] that in the developing countries more than 1.6 million people are using unhygienic water and among them, most of the people suffer from diarrhoea and water-related diseases
Authors [3] noted that the natural organic matter combines with Chlorine during water treatment when applied for disinfection generate disinfection byproducts (DBPs) and in particular forms halogenated DBPs, this enhances the production of free radicals in the body
The results showed that temperature, extraction time, and particle size were among the factors that affected the extract's yields during oil extraction from the seeds
Summary
The water crisis is a severe issue of global concern; it has been reported by [12] that in the developing countries more than 1.6 million people are using unhygienic water and among them, most of the people suffer from diarrhoea and water-related diseases. Such reasons necessitate a sustainable, cost-friendly alternative treatment process to overcome the current water challenges. Authors [3] noted that the natural organic matter combines with Chlorine during water treatment when applied for disinfection generate disinfection byproducts (DBPs) and in particular forms halogenated DBPs, this enhances the production of free radicals in the body
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