Adsorption Characteristics of Natural Filtering Media (2012)
Undergraduates: Caleb Ollech, Jennifer Casanova
Faculty Advisor: Howard Weinberg
Department: Health Environmental Sciences & Engineering
Environmental pollution can be identified as one of the major problems of developed and developing countries. Engineered wetlands are an innovative and inexpensive treatment approach that has the potential to treat organic and inorganic compounds in wastewater via solid-liquid adsorption.
Many industrial waste treatment processes used in the textile, food processing, cosmetic, and paper industries mimic the solid-liquid adsorption mechanism of engineered wetlands by passing effluent through activated carbon. Due to its high cost and need of regeneration, however, other materials have been studied for use in its place. The potential utility of an effective low-cost, naturally occurring adsorbent is high, especially in developing nations where access to synthetic or engineered adsorbents may be limited.
Given the resource limitations present in many parts of the world, as well as the concerning agricultural use of endocrine-active pesticides in several developing regions, this study was aimed at evaluating the adsorption potential of cheap and widely abundant natural filtering media (sand, Stalite aggregate, and a local agricultural soil) in removal of the endocrine-active compounds diquat and paraquat. Methylene blue (MB) was employed as a surrogate model for these compounds.