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Water Purification

Article · January 2015

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Kasun Thivanka Samarasiri

University of Moratuwa
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WATER PURIFICATION
Kasun Thivanka
Samarasiri
Level 4, Undergraduate
A
ir, water, food and shelter are
the four basic needs that all
living beings need for their
living and survival. Among them the
water plays a significant role in
balancing the bond between all living
organisms by the contribution of the
processes such as growth of plants,
photosynthesis, greenhouse effect,
global wind patterns and etc.
Likewise, water involves with each
and every other aspects of the
survival of living organisms. According
to international geological surveys,
about 71% of the Earth’s surface is
water covered by the oceans in which
containing 96.54% of all the Earth’s
water which is completely
undrinkable due to the salinity. The
rest of the 3.46% of Earth’s water is
located at places such as icebergs,
groundwater, lakes, soil water,
atmosphere and etc. and among
them only 1.42% is fresh water that
could be used for the survival of the
living beings. According to the
researches, it is found that only less
than 1% of total Earth’s water can be
easily accumulated as the main
source of fresh water for the survival
of the human race.
Physical/Chemical
Water Storage
Treatment
Due to the rapid growth of the world
population and the industrialization,
the availability of fresh water sources
is reducing day by day. Various
processes of the water purification
have been developed by the scientists
and researchers in order to overcome
this problem of water pollution. There
are two main types of water
purification. They are drinking water
treatment and the wastewater
38
STUDENT SECTION
treatment. In the drinking water
treatment, the water has to be
characteristics, turbidity, particles,
colour, taste, odor, temperature and
collected from their original sources etc. should be analyzed. In order to
such as rivers and reservoirs and select and develop appropriate
purify them under the
applicable quality
standards followed by the “Due to the rapid growth
environmental protection
license. After the of the world population
purification, that water and the industrialization,
should be healthy for
human consumption and the availability of fresh
free of
microorganisms
harmful
and
water sources is reducing
organic and inorganic day by day. Various
pollutants. In the
wastewater treatment, processes of the water
the wastewater from the
industrial processes
purification have been
should be collected and developed by the scientists
purified before releasing
it to different and researchers in order
environments such as to overcome this problem
surface waters, lands for
irrigation purposes, of water pollution.”
marine coastal areas and
etc. After the purification,
that water should fulfill
the applicable quality standards of treatment method, water’s physical,
discharging or else it would be chemical and microbiological
considered as an act of violating the characteristics should be analyzed.
environmental norms.
Water from different sources and
Scientists and researchers have places has different characteristics.
developed various processes of water After the analysis, the appropriate
purification for different purposes by method of water purification can be
examining the major constituents and developed. The water purification is
physical characteristics of the generally carried out by the processes
untreated water. Considering the such as filtration, coagulation,
Biological Fina filtration/
Disinfection
Treatment adsorption
constituents, major inorganic flocculation, adsorption, clarification,
compounds such aeration, sedimentation, softening,
as chlorination, oxidation, disinfection,
2−
𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶2+ , 𝑀𝑀𝑀𝑀𝑀𝑀𝑀𝑀2+ , 𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶+ , 𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶 − , 𝐹𝐹𝐹𝐹 − , 𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁3− , 𝐶𝐶𝐶𝐶𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁32− , 𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑆𝑁𝑁𝑁𝑁membrane
4 , 𝑒𝑒𝑒𝑒𝑒𝑒𝑒𝑒𝑒𝑒𝑒𝑒. processes and etc. These
, minor inorganic compounds such as processes can be customized and new
cadmium, chromium, copper, lead, methods of water purification can be
mercury, arsenic, etc., natural and developed for the industrial
synthetic organic compounds and wastewater treatment or drinking
other living organisms such as water purification. The general block
bacteria, algae, viruses, etc. should be diagram of water purification process
analyzed. Considering physical is mentioned below.
 STUDENT SECTION
Some of the developed technologies References
of water purification are highly
expensive while others are cheap but 1. http://eschooltoday.com/science/
less effective under certain needs-of-living-organisms/five-
circumstances. There is no exact way things-living-things-need-to-
of water purification. Therefore the survive.html
method of water purification should 2. http://www.skepticalscience.com/
be selected and developed according water-vapor-greenhouse-gas.htm
to the characteristics of untreated 3. http://water.usgs.gov/edu/earthh
water, water quality standards and owmuch.html
the requirements of the industry or 4. http://www.epa.gov/ogwdw/cons
the domestic users. After developing umer/pdf/hist.pdf
the most suitable and economical 5. http://water.usgs.gov/edu/drinkse
process by the laboratory scale awater.html
researches, the process should be 6. Book : Environmental Engineering
scaled up into a pilot scale design and - Fundamentals, Sustainability,
the pilot plant should be run to Design
achieve the required standards (by James R. Mihelcic, Julie Beth
because the projects in water Zimmerman)
purification plants are always dealt
with very huge investments. After a
successful pilot plant design, the
actual plant should be constructed.
Some knowledge in civil engineering
as well as mechanical engineering will
be required for the construction part.
In some cases for automation of the
plant, the knowledge in electronics
needed. Likewise, the construction of
a water purification plant (drinking
water or wastewater) will be
successful by the combination of the
people specialized in the field of
chemistry, chemical engineering and
civil engineering.

Water purification is one of the most

rapidly developing fields in the world.
In some countries in the world such
as Saudi Arabia, Dubai, Israel, United
Arab Emirates, Australia, China and
etc. convert sea water into fresh
water for human consumption and
irrigation processes by desalination
technologies. Likewise water
purification is one of the rapidly
developing fields in the field of
science and technology followed by
the set of laboratory scale researches
and the process scaling up by
engineering techniques. In Sri Lankan
scenario, the role of the chemical
engineer in water purification is to
find the most suitable and economical
method by optimizing the process of
water purification.

39

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