WATER TREATMENT

PRESENTED BY: VAISHALI S.

VIGNESH D.

COLLEGE: VELS SRINIVASA COLLEGE OF ENGG.

EMAIL ID: [email protected]

[email protected]

CONTACT: 9941468116
 ABSTRACT

Water treatment describes those processes used to make water more acceptable for a
desired end-use. These can include use as drinking water, industrial processes, medical and many
other uses. The goal of all water treatment process is to remove existing contaminants in the
water, or reduce the concentration of such contaminants so the water becomes fit for its desired
end-use. One such use is returning water that has been used back into the natural environment
without adverse ecological impact.

The processes involved in treating water for drinking purpose may be solids separation using
physical such as settling and filtration, chemical such as disinfection and coagulation.

Biological processes are also employed in the treatment of wastewater and these processes may
include, for example, aerated lagoons, activated sludge or slow sand filters.

Portable water purification

Abandoned Water Purification Plant Springfield, Tennessee, United States

Water purification is the removal of contaminants from untreated water to produce drinking
water that is pure enough for its intended use, most commonly human consumption. Substances
that are removed during the process of drinking water treatment include bacteria, algae, viruses,
fungi, minerals such as iron, manganese and sulphur, and man-made chemical pollutants
including fertilisers.

It is important to take measures to make available water of desirable quality at the consumer end.
That leads to protection of the treated water during conveyance and distribution after treatment.
It is common practice to have residual disinfectants in the treated water in order to kill any
bacteriological contamination after water treatment.

World Health Organisation (WHO) guidelines are generally followed throughout the world for
drinking water quality requirements. In addition of the WHO guidelines, each country or
territory or water supply body can have their own guidelines in order for consumers to have
access to safe drinking water.

Processes for drinking water

The combination of following processes is used for municipal drinking water treatment
worldwide:

 Pre-chlorination - for algae control and arresting any biological growth

 Aeration - along with pre-chlorination for removal of dissolved iron and manganese
 Coagulation - for flocculation
 Coagulant aids also known as polyelectrolytes - to improve coagulation and for thicker
floc formation
 Sedimentation - for solids separation, that is, removal of suspended solids trapped in the
floc
 Filtration - for removal of carried over flock
 Disinfection - for killing bacteria

There is no unique solution (selection of processes) for any type of water. Also, it is difficult to
standardise the solution in the form of processes for water from different sources. Treatability
studies for each source of water in different seasons need to be carried out to arrive at most
appropriate processes.

Sewage treatment
Sewage treatment is the process that removes the majority of the contaminants from wastewater
or sewage and produces both a liquid effluent suitable for disposal to the natural environment
and a sludge. To be effective, sewage must be conveyed to a treatment plant by appropriate pipes
and infrastructure and the process itself must be subject to regulation and controls. Some
wastewaters require different and sometimes specialized treatment methods. At the simplest
level, treatment of sewage and most wastewaters is carried out through separation of solids from
liquids, usually by settlement. By progressively converting dissolved material into solids, usually
a biological floc which is then settled out, an effluent stream of increasing purity is produced.

In developing countries
As of 2006, waterborne diseases are estimated to cause 1.8 million deaths each year. These
deaths are attributable to inadequate public sanitation systems and it is clear that proper sewerage
(or other options as small-scale water treatment) need to be installed.[1]

Appropriate technology options in water treatment include both community-scale and household-
scale point-of-use (POU) designs. Military surplus water treatment units like the ERDLator are
still seen in developing countries. Newer military style Reverse Osmosis Water Purification
Units (ROWPU) are portable, self-contained water treatment plants are becoming more available
for public use.

In order for the decrease of waterborne diseases to have long term effects, water treatment
programs implemented by research and development groups in developing countries must be
sustainable by its own residents. This can ensure the efficiency of such programs after the
departure of the research team as monitoring is difficult because of the remoteness of many
locations.

Whilst solid manure heaps outdoors can give rise to polluting wastewaters from runoff, this type
of waste is usually relatively easy to treat by containment and/or covering of the heap.

Animal slurries require special handling and are usually treated by containment in lagoons before
disposal by spray or trickle application to grassland. Constructed wetlands are sometimes used to
facilitate treatment of animal wastes, as are anaerobic lagoons. Excessive application or
application to sodden land or insufficient land area can result in direct runoff to watercourses,
with the potential for causing severe pollution. Application of slurries to land overlying aquifers
can result in direct contamination or, more commonly, elevation of nitrogen levels as nitrite or
nitrate.

The disposal of any wastewater containing animal waste upstream of a drinking water intake can
pose serious health problems to those drinking the water because of the highly resistant spores
present in many animals that are capable of causing disabling in humans. This risk exists even
for very low-level seepage via shallow surface drains or from rainfall run-off.

Some animal slurries are treated by mixing with straws and composted at high temperature to
produce a bacteriologically sterile and friable manure for soil improvement

Industrial wastewater treatment

Industrial wastewater treatment covers the mechanisms and processes used to treat waters that
have been contaminated in some way by anthropogenic industrial or commercial activities prior
to its release into the environment or its re-use.

Most industries produce some wet waste although recent trends in the developed world have
been to minimise such production or recycle such waste within the production process. However,
many industries remain dependent on processes that produce wastewaters.

Sources of industrial wastewater

Agricultural waste
Iron and steel industry

The production of iron from its ores involves powerful reduction reactions in blast furnaces.
Cooling waters are inevitably contaminated with products especially ammonia and cyanide.
Production of coke from coal in coking plants also requires water cooling and the use of water in
by-products separation. Contamination of waste streams includes gasification products such as
benzene, naphthalene, anthracene, cyanide, ammonia, phenols, cresols together with a range of
more complex organic compounds known collectively as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons
(PAH).

The conversion of iron or steel into sheet, wire or rods requires hot and cold mechanical
transformation stages frequently employing water as a lubricant and coolant. Contaminants
include hydraulic oils, tallow and particulate solids. Final treatment of iron and steel products
before onward sale into manufacturing includes pickling in strong mineral acid to remove rust
and prepare the surface for tin or chromium plating or for other surface treatments such as
galvanisation or painting. The two acids commonly used are hydrochloric acid and sulfuric acid.
Wastewaters include acidic rinse waters together with waste acid. Although many plants operate
acid recovery plants, (particularly those using Hydrochloric acid), where the mineral acid is
boiled away from the iron salts, there remains a large volume of highly acid ferrous sulfate or
ferrous chloride to be disposed of. Many steel industry wastewaters are contaminated by
hydraulic oil also known as soluble oil.

Mines and quarries

The principal waste-waters associated with mines and quarries are slurries of rock particles in
water. These arise from rainfall washing exposed surfaces and haul roads and also from rock
washing and grading processes. Volumes of water can be very high, especially rainfall related
arisings on large sites. Some specialized separation operations, such as coal washing to separate
coal from native rock using density gradients, can produce wastewater contaminated by fine
particulate haematite and surfactants. Oils and hydraulic oils are also common contaminants.
Wastewater from metal mines and ore recovery plants are inevitably contaminated by the
minerals present in the native rock formations. Following crushing and extraction of the
desirable materials, undesirable materials may become contaminated in the wastewater. For
metal mines, this can include unwanted metals such as zinc and other materials such as arsenic.
Extraction of high value metals such as gold and silver may generate slimes containing very fine
particles in where physical removal of contaminants becomes particularly difficult.

Food industry
Wastewater generated from agricultural and food operations has distinctive characteristics that
set it apart from common municipal wastewater managed by public or private wastewater
treatment plants throughout the world: it is biodegradable and nontoxic, but that has high
concentrations of biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) and suspended solids (SS). The
constituents of food and agriculture wastewater are often complex to predict due to the
differences in BOD and pH in effluents from vegetable, fruit, and meat products and due to the
seasonal nature of food processing and postharvesting.

Processing of food from raw materials requires large volumes of high grade water. Vegetable
washing generates waters with high loads of particulate matter and some dissolved organics. It
may also contain surfactants.

Animal slaughter and processing produces very strong organic waste from body fluids, such as
blood, and gut contents. This wastewater is frequently contaminated by significant levels of
antibiotics and growth hormones from the animals and by a variety of pesticides used to control
external parasites. An insecticide residue in fleeces is a particular problem in treating waters
generated in wool processing.

Processing food for sale produces wastes generated from cooking which are often rich in plant
organic material and may also contain salt, flavourings, colouring material and acids or alkali.
Very significant quantities of oil or fats may also be present.

Complex organic chemicals industry

A range of industries manufacture or use complex organic chemicals. These include pesticides,
pharmaceuticals, paints and dyes, petro-chemicals, detergents, plastics, paper pollution, etc.
Waste waters can be contaminated by feed-stock materials, by-products, product material in
soluble or particulate form, washing and cleaning agents, solvents and added value products such
as plasticisers.

Nuclear industry
The waste production from the nuclear and radio-chemicals industry is dealt with at radioactive
waste.Water treatment for the production of drinking water is dealt with elsewhere. (See water
purification.) Many industries have a need to treat water to obtain very high quality water for
demanding purposes. Water treatment produces organic and mineral sludges from filtration and
sedimentation. Ion exchange using natural or synthetic resins removes calcium, magnesium and
carbonate ions from water, replacing them with hydrogen and hydroxyl ions. Regeneration of ion
exchange columns with strong acids and alkalis produces a wastewater rich in hardness ions
which are readily precipitated out, especially when in admixture with other wastewaters.

Treatment of industrial wastewater

The different types of contamination of wastewater require a variety of strategies to remove the
contamination.
Solids removal
Most solids can be removed using simple sedimentation techniques with the solids recovered as
slurry or sludge. Very fine solids and solids with densities close to the density of water pose
special problems. In such case filtration or ultrafiltration may be required. Although, flocculation
may be used, using alum salts or the addition of polyelectrolytes.

Oils and grease removal

A typical API oil-water separator used in many industries

Many oils can be recovered from open water surfaces by skimming devices. Considered a
dependable and cheap way to remove oil, grease and other hydrocarbons from water, oil
skimmers can sometimes achieve the desired level of water purity. At other times, skimming is
also a cost-efficient method to remove most of the oil before using membrane filters and
chemical processes. Skimmers will prevent filters from blinding prematurely and keep chemical
costs down because there is less oil to process.

Because grease skimming involves higher viscosity hydrocarbons, skimmers must be equipped
with heaters powerful enough to keep grease fluid for discharge. If floating grease forms into
solid clumps or mats, a spray bar, aerator or mechanical apparatus can be used to facilitate
removal.
However, hydraulic oils and the majority of oils that have degraded to any extent will also have a
soluble or emulsified component that will require further treatment to eliminate. Dissolving or
emulsifying oil using surfactants or solvents usually exacerbates the problem rather than solving
it, producing wastewater that is more difficult to treat.

The wastewaters from large-scale industries such as oil refineries, petrochemical plants,
chemical plants, and natural gas processing plants commonly contain gross amounts of oil and
suspended solids. Those industries use a device known as an API oil-water separator which is
designed to separate the oil and suspended solids from their wastewater effluents. The name is
derived from the fact that such separators are designed according to standards published by the
American Petroleum Institute (API)

The API separator is a gravity separation device designed by using Stokes Law to define the rise
velocity of oil droplets based on their density and size. The design is based on the specific
gravity difference between the oil and the wastewater because that difference is much smaller
than the specific gravity difference between the suspended solids and water. The suspended
solids settles to the bottom of the separator as a sediment layer, the oil rises to top of the
separator and the cleansed wastewater is the middle layer between the oil layer and the solids.

Typically, the oil layer is skimmed off and subsequently re-processed or disposed of, and the
bottom sediment layer is removed by a chain and flight scraper (or similar device) and a sludge
pump. The water layer is sent to further treatment consisting usually of a Electroflotation module
for additional removal of any residual oil and then to some type of biological treatment unit for
removal of undesirable dissolved chemical compounds.

A typical parallel plate separator

Parallel plate separatorsare similar to API separators but they include tilted parallel plate
assemblies (also known as parallel packs). The parallel plates provide more surface for
suspended oil droplets to coalesce into larger globules. Such separators still depend upon the
specific gravity between the suspended oil and the water. However, the parallel plates enhance
the degree of oil-water separation. The result is that a parallel plate separator requires
significantly less space than a conventional API separator to achieve the same degree of
separation.

Removal of biodegradable organics

Biodegradable organic material of plant or animal origin is usually possible to treat using
extended conventional wastewater treatment processes such as activated sludge or trickling filter.
Problems can arise if the wastewater is excessively diluted with washing water or is highly
concentrated such as neat blood or milk. The presence of cleaning agents, disinfectants,
pesticides, or antibiotics can have detrimental impacts on treatment processes.

Activated sludge process

A generalized, schematic diagram of an activated sludge process.

Activated sludge is a biochemical process for treating sewage and industrial wastewater that uses
air (or oxygen) and microorganisms to biologically oxidize organic pollutants, producing a waste
sludge (or floc) containing the oxidized material. In general, an activated sludge process
includes:

 An aeration tank where air (or oxygen) is injected and thoroughly mixed into the wastewater.
 A settling tank (usually referred to as a "clarifier" or "settler") to allow the waste sludge to settle.
Part of the waste sludge is recycled to the aeration tank and the remaining waste sludge is
removed for further treatment and ultimate disposal.
Trickling filter process

Image 1: A schematic cross-section of the contact face of the bed media in a trickling filter

A typical complete trickling filter system

A trickling filter consists of a bed of rocks, gravel, slag, peat moss, or plastic media over which
wastewater flows downward and contacts a layer (or film) of microbial slime covering the bed
media. Aerobic conditions are maintained by forced air flowing through the bed or by natural
convection of air. The process involves adsorption of organic compounds in the wastewater by
the microbial slime layer, diffusion of air into the slime layer to provide the oxygen required for
the biochemical oxidation of the organic compounds. The end products include carbon dioxide
gas, water and other products of the oxidation. As the slime layer thickens, it becomes difficult
for the air to penetrate the layer and an inner anaerobic layer is formed.
The components of a complete trickling filter system are: fundamental components:

 A bed of filter medium upon which a layer of microbial slime is promoted and developed.
 An enclosure or a container which houses the bed of filter medium.
 A system for distributing the flow of wastewater over the filter medium.
 A system for removing and disposing of any sludge from the treated effluent.

The treatment of sewage or other wastewater with trickling filters is among the oldest and most
well characterized treatment technologies.

A trickling filter is also often called a trickle filter, trickling biofilter, biofilter, biological filter or
biological trickling filter.

Treatment of other organics

Synthetic organic materials including solvents, paints, pharmaceuticals, pesticides, coking
products and so forth can be very difficult to treat. Treatment methods are often specific to the
material being treated. Methods include Advanced Oxidation Processing, distillation, adsorption,
vitrification, incineration, chemical immobilisation or landfill disposal. Some materials such as
some detergents may be capable of biological degradation and in such cases; a modified form of
wastewater treatment can be used.

Treatment of acids and alkalis

Acids and alkalis can usually be neutralised under controlled conditions. Neutralisation
frequently produces a precipitate that will require treatment as a solid residue that may also be
toxic. In some cases, gasses may be evolved requiring treatment for the gas stream. Some other
forms of treatment are usually required following neutralisation.

Waste streams rich in hardness ions as from de-ionisation processes can readily lose the hardness
ions in a buildup of precipitated calcium and magnesium salts. This precipitation process can
cause severe furring of pipes and can, in extreme cases, because the blockage of disposal pipes.
A 1 metre diameter industrial marine discharge pipe serving a major chemicals complex was
blocked by such salts in the 1970s. Treatment is by concentration of de-ionisation waste waters
and disposal to landfill or by careful pH management of the released wastewater.

Treatment of toxic materials

Toxic materials including many organic materials, metals (such as zinc, silver, cadmium,
thallium, etc.) acids, alkalis, non-metallic elements (such as arsenic or selenium) are generally
resistant to biological processes unless very dilute. Metals can often be precipitated out by
changing the pH or by treatment with other chemicals. Many, however, are resistant to treatment
or mitigation and may require concentration followed by landfilling or recycling. Disolved
organics can be incinerated within the wastewater by Advanced Oxidation Processes.