The Potential and Benefits of Artificial Barrier Application at RBF

Abstract

Water abstraction for water treatment of portable water especially riverbank filtration (RBF) is essential to be safe and clean. Due to the awareness towards the spread of contaminants and deterioration of water resources, the needs of artificial barrier is seen as crucial. An artificial barrier is a man-made vertical barrier to pre-treat the abstraction water from the water intake structure. The proposed artificial barrier is a mixture of sand (local soil), granular activated carbon (GAC) and zeolite. In this study, the three adsorbents were tested for their adsorption and permeability. The effects of adsorbent dose on the adsorption of the turbidity, iron and zinc were investigated. After treatment with sand, the levels of turbidity, iron and zinc were observed to decrease by 93.7%, 85.15% and 68.5%, respectively. For GAC, the levels of turbidity, iron and zinc decreased by 96.9%, 99.2% and 36.3%, respectively. The reduction on the levels of turbidity, iron and zinc was preferable by zeolite with 98.3%, 93.0% and 98.8%, respectively. By using Langmuir and Freundlich adsorption isotherm, the result indicated that the adsorption of adsorbents mostly obeyed Freundlich model. The relationship is an empirical equation which has an asymptotic maximum as pressure increase without bond.