POTENTIAL OF ORANGE PEEL AS A COAGULANT FOR WATER TREATMENT
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Abstract
The effectiveness of chemicals as coagulants such as alum and ferric chloride is well recognized. However, there are many disadvantages associated with the usage such as high operational costs, detrimental effects on human health, production of large sludge volumes and the fact that it is significantly affect pH of treated water. It is therefore desirable to replace these chemical coagulants with natural-based coagulants such as from fruit peels to counteract the aforementioned drawbacks. Therefore, the aim of this study is to investigate the efficiency of fruits peel as natural coagulants in treating water over the use of alum and optimum dosage of
natural coagulant used. In terms of selection of natural coagulants, this study focused on the local waste materials, which is orange peels. These peels were collected from neighbourhood and local stall and market.
These peels were prepared by washing, drying, grinding and finally sieving, thus becoming powder of natural coagulants ready to be used. A series of jar test was then performed by using three different water sample which
are Taman Metropolitan Kepong Lake, Seri Serdang Lake and Taman Cempaka Lake to determine the effect of individual natural coagulants on the efficiency of turbidity removal and coagulation activity under various
operating factors such as pH and coagulant dosage. From the findings, optimum dosage for treating 300 ml individually for those 3 lakes water is 9mg/l, respectively showed turbidity removal of 68 - 80%. The results
proved that the use of orange peels as new composite coagulant in water treatment is a feasible option in enhancing the reduction performance of turbidity. Moreover, the usage of this natural coagulant can reduce
health risk from long term used of chemical coagulant along with lessen the chemical sludge product to the environment.
