Use of plant based coagulants for water treatment

Environmental Engineering

Coagulation is one of the most important processes to remove colloidal particles and color from water and the chemicals used for the process are called coagulants. The most commonly used coagulant for water treatment is alum i.e.; aluminium sulphate. The use of Alum as a coagulant for the treatment of water has scientifically proven to be harmful to humans. Years and years of consumption of water treated with alum has proven to cause Alzheimer’s disease, damage the nervous tissues, and many other ailments in several human beings. It also has a lot of cons; like it produces a lot of sludge, has a tendency to change the pH of water, tendency to corrode the pipes carrying treated water, etc. Also, the cost of importing alum is difficult for some developing countries. Here is where the use of plant based coagulants comes in. They are not harmful to humans, don’t produce a lot of sludge and can be available even in developing countries. In this paper, plant based coagulants like Chickpeas, Palmyra Palm (Borassus flabellifer), Peanut seeds (Arachis hypogaea), and Aloe Vera are being used to treat water collected from Kadamprayar river. The coagulants were chosen on the basis of their easy availability. The characteristics of the water sample like pH, turbidity, TDS, BOD, electrical conductivity, hardness, chlorides etc before and after coagulation with plant based coagulants are compared with that of alum. The percentage efficiency of turbidity removal is also determined for each coagulant to determine which coagulant is the most efficient out of the six plant based coagulants that have been chosen.

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