A study on removal of natural organic matter from raw drinking water using activated carbon from maize cob

Abstract

The world is not running out of water. The real challenge is to provide enough clean water to a rapidly growing global population (Ashwani Kumar Singh, 2017). The use of chlorine as a disinfectant has made an immense contribution to the safety of drinking water supplies with the recent discovery of the formation of Disinfection By-Products (DBPs), with the presence of Natural Organic Matter (NOM) as the main contributor. In Uganda, the maize is a widely produced and preferred staple food, hence, generating large quantities of agricultural wastes which is usually disposed of in the nearby environment or is burnt off as fuel which contributes to air pollution and buildup of greenhouse gases. As an alternative to burning of maize cob waste, which leads to air pollution and buildup of greenhouse gases, this study sought to investigate the performance of activated carbon from maize cobs as an adsorption medium, to be used as an extra step in the water treatment process, before prechlorination. Using COD, Turbidity, UV254 (Transmittance), Total Iron, True color, as the parameters to measure presence of NOM in the raw drinking water; this research aimed at shedding some light on prospective investigations on the performance of maize cobs as an adsorption media in the removal of NOM, as a precursor step before the pre-chlorination stage of the water treatment process. It was observed that the upflow configuration had better removal efficiency for most parameters, especially turbidity, COD.