Development of composite filters from biochars for wastewater treatment

Abstract

ABSTRACT The aim of this research is to develop a bio-nanocomposite filter from locally sourced agro-wastes to treat waste and effluent water. The filters were formulated from coconut and peanut shell biochars, with kaolin as the binding agent and rice husk as the pore-creating agent within nanometric size range using planetary balling milling. The batch composition of the filters was carried out in 10 groups and labelled F1 to F10. The parameters for comparison include linear shrinkage, apparent porosity, water absorption, hardness test, bulk density, and modulus of rupture. The results indicate that the filter F7 showed more resistance to indention with a hardness value of 29.4 than the control with a hardness value of 26.6 and also the flow rate in F7 was noted to be 23.07 ml/h, whereas F9 recorded the least flow rate of 1.03 ml/h. It was also observed that filter F8 had a higher bulk density value of 2.587 g cm-3 due to its high degree of compaction, while the control had a lesser bulk density value of 1.9990 g cm-3. However, the control proved to have a higher apparent porosity of 50%, which was slightly higher than filter F10 with 49.46% apparent porosity.