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Water is a naturally occurring substance. It can be seen in the atmosphere in the form of vapor, on the earth's surface as water, ice, snow, and below the surface as groundwater which occupies all the voids within a geologic stratum. The total water supply of the earth is in constant circulation from earth to atmosphere, and back to the earth. This process is known as the water or hydrological cycle (Zumdahl, 2021). Water is useful for life, however, in recent times, water resources have been exposed to pollution from different sources as a result of human activities such as domestic/household, industrial and agricultural processes. The concern of the public over the impact of wastewater pollution on the environment has increased. Many wastewater treatment techniques have been employed to mitigate this impact, but they are still limited, most notably because of the high cost of operation (Dhote, Ingoleb, and Chavhana, 2012).
Water pollution takes place when substances or materials that will deteriorate the water quality are discharged into it. These substances and materials lead to several issues for people, animals, organisms, and their habitats as well as the environment (Morin-Crini and Crini 2017). Metcalf and Eddy (1991) defined wastewater as water whose physical, chemical, or biological properties have been altered due to introducing substances that make it hazardous for usage. The daily activities of a man highly depend on the usage of water, therefore introducing waste into water is inevitable. Some of these substances which are regarded as pollutants include body wastes (faeces and urine), chemicals, micro-organisms (pathogenic and un-pathogenic), germs, soaps (bar and detergents), sand, dust, dirt, hair, laundry powder, food scraps, fat, toilet paper and many more. In reality, most of the freshwater supplied ends up to be wastewater after usage, it is thus imperative that these waters are treated to save the environment as well as store the natural resource. (Metcalf and Eddy, 2003).
Wastewater treatment is the technological process used to eradicate most of the contaminants present in wastewater in order to ensure the good public health and a sound environment. Hence, wastewater management comprises of handling wastewater so as to protect the environment, ensure public health as well as economic, social, and political soundness (Metcalf and Eddy, 1991). According to Amoatey and Bani (2011), wastewater has been a practice since long before the nineteenth century, it was however between the late 1800s and early 1900s, that many wastewater treatment process alternatives were explored and in 1920, more stable and adequate treatment processes used today were developed. Generally, conventional wastewater treatment involves combining physical, chemical, and biological operations and processes to remove pollutants i.e., insoluble particles and soluble contaminants from wastewater (Crini and Lichtfouse, 2018).
Filtration is one of the most important treatment processes used in wastewater treatment. The main purpose of filtration is to produce effluent of high quality so that it can be reused for various purposes. Any type of filter with attached biomass on the filter media can be defined as a biofilter (Metcalf and Eddy, 2003). They include materials such as horizontal rock filters in a polluted stream, granular activated carbon (GAC), and sand filter in the wastewater treatment plant. Biofilters have been successfully used for air, water, and wastewater treatment. It was first introduced in England in 1893 as a trickling filter in wastewater treatment (Metcalf and Eddy, 1991), and since then, it has been successfully used for treating domestic and industrial wastewater. Recent research shows that certain materials such as rice husk (or hull), coconut fiber (coir), sugar cane (also known as bagasse), maize cobs, sawdust, bed of sand, peat, shredded tires, foam, crushed glass, geo-textile fabric, and anthracite can be used as filter media in wastewater treatment either separately or to augment conventional filters such as sand, crushed rock or gravel, and activated carbon.
Corn with the scientific name Zea Mays also known as maize consumed and used for other food production all over the world. The cultivation of corn produces a large number of corn cobs as agricultural waste (Janani, Sudarsan, and Prasanna, 2019). Due to the non-consumption of corn cob, farmers resort to burning them for fuel which regardless adds to air pollution and ultimately global warming. The high porous structure and rigidity of corn cob, make it possess adsorption properties (Nethaji, Sivasamy, Mandal, 2013; Buasri et al., 2012). Previous studies have shown that colored dyes, oil and grease, detergents, salts, suspended particles, and some heavy metals such as Chromium, Lead, Zinc, and Cobalt get adsorbed to corn cob surface (Al-Degs et al., 2006; Vafakhah et al., 2014). According to Zhang, Ghaly, and Li, (2012) and Khan and Wahab, (2007) 70-80% of household wastewater contaminants can be removed by corn cobs domestically. Vaughan, Chung, and Wayne (2001) presented that corn cob can be converted into activated charcoal by burning therefore improving bioresource recycling and biomass utilization. The produced charcoal from this process is has a relatively high surface area and consequently possesses high adsorption properties for controlling pollution (Maimon, Friedler, and Gross, 2014; Ghisi and Ferreira, 2007). This has spurred this study to investigate this material in wastewater treatment and treatment of water samples with heavy metals.
According to Benetti, (2008), water, food, and energy supply are the three main problems faced by the world today. Therefore, to solve these problems, domestic wastewater is now treated as a resource instead of a waste. The 1st and 3rd problems can be solved by treating wastewater for domestic consumption, landscaping, and crop irrigation. Day (1996) presented that due to the massive increase in the world’s human population, water will become one of the scarcest resources in the 21st century. As human numbers increase, there would be greater strains on the available resources and a greater threat will be posted on the environmental sources. A report by the Secretary-General of the United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development (UNCSD, 1997) concluded that there is no sustainability in the current use of freshwater by either developing or developed nations and that worldwide, water usage has been growing at more than three times the world’s population increase, consequently leading to widespread public health problems, limiting economic and agricultural development and adversely affecting a wide range of ecosystems. This has motivated more comprehensive research in water treatment and management. Wastewater must be properly treated and managed to retain equilibrium in the earth even if it is expensive.
In this study, the suggestion of the usage of corn cob ash in wastewater treatment will reduce the outrageous prices of wastewater treatment, make it user-friendly as well as easily accessible. Thus, by the discoveries made in the preparation process of this study, the whole engineering world can go a step closer in the reduction of costs and expensive filtration medium.
The study aims to maximize the use of corn cob ash for the tertiary treatment of wastewater (filtration).
Specifically, the research is set out to achieve the following objectives:
The identified research questions for this project are provided below:
The deliverables of this project are a project report, influent of wastewater sample, the effluent of filtered wastewater sample through the corn cob ash, as well as results and comparison. The influent and effluent would be tested for physical, chemical, and biological parameters of wastewater according to WHO and national standards and would be compared to the calculated efficiency and treatment rate of the corn cob ash filter media. Also, the report should contain complete documentation of the laboratory experiment procedure from start to finish, how various process variables were gotten, how the physical, chemical, and biological parameters were tested and the instruments used for the test, as well as how the biofilter was used and how the results were gotten.
This project mainly focuses on assessing the usage of corn cob ash; the product of charring a material regarded as agricultural waste in the tertiary treatment of wastewater. Simply put, treating waste with waste.
This project focuses on secondary research and laboratory experiments. They are discussed below:
The secondary research in this project will utilize a systematic approach (Johnson et al., 2016) to review the works of literature. The steps involved in the systematic review of the literature are provided below:
Step 1: Identify the research questions that can be used for the project.
Step 2: Identify the keywords that should be used to research the works of literature.
Step 3: Extract the journals and books that are appropriate for this project.
Step 4: Write the literature review chapter.
The laboratory experiments would cover a large part of this project. They would be carried out in stages, and as such described below;
The risk assessment conducted for this project is provided in the table below:
Table 1: Risk assessment
Risk
Impact
Mitigation Plan
Inability to meet the deadline
Low
Get an extension from the supervisor in due time
Inability to get required process inputs
Moderate
Refer to municipalities, research institutes, and laboratory technicians for help
Inability to properly develop the wastewater treatment process set up
Refer to laboratory technicians for help
Inability to test for a wide range of physical, chemical, and biological properties of the sample
High
Use important and custom parameters for making conclusions.
Insufficient data
Refer to journals and textbooks for help
Table 2: Project Plan
Task Name
Start Date
End Date
Duration (Days)
Initial Research
15/01/2022
29/01/2022
14
Proposal
06/02/2022
21
Secondary Research
18/03/2022
40
Introduction Chapter
23/03/2022
5
Literature Review Chapter
20/04/2022
24
Methodology Chapter
02/05/2022
12
Sourcing of required wastewater samples and materials
02/06/2022
30
Presentation 1
10/06/2022
8
Laboratory Experiments
24/06/2022
Evaluation of Gotten Results
01/07/2022
7
Discussion Chapter
11/07/2022
10
Evaluation Chapter
16/07/2022
Conclusion Chapter
18/07/2022
2
Project Management Chapter
20/07/2022
Abstract and Report compilation
22/07/2022
Report Proofreading
01/08/2022
Presentation 2
11/08/2022
Al-Degs Yahya S., El-Barghouthi Musa I., Issa Ayman A., Khraisheh Majeda A., Walker Gavin M., (2006). Sorption of Zn (II), Pb (II), and Co (II) using natural sorbents: Equilibrium and kinetic studies, Water Research, Volume 40, Issue 14, Pages 2645-2658, ISSN 0043-1354. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.watres.2006.05.018.
Amoatey Peace (Mrs.) and Professor Richard Bani (2011). Wastewater Management. Waste Water - Evaluation and Management, Faculty of Engineering Sciences, University of Ghana, Ghana.
Benetti, A.D. 2008. Water reuse: issues, technologies and applications. Engenharia Sanitaria eAmbiental, 13(3), 247-248.
Buasri Achanai, Chaiyut Nattawut, Tapang Kessarin, Jaroensin Supparoek, Panphrom Sutheera, (2012). Equilibrium and Kinetic Studies of Biosorption of Zn (II) Ions from Wastewater Using Modified Corn Cob, APCBEE Procedia, Volume 3, Pages 60-64, ISSN 2212-6708, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apcbee.2012.06.046.
Crini, G. and Lichtfouse, E., (2018). Wastewater Treatment: An Overview. Environmental Chemistry for a Sustainable World, pp.1-21.
Day, D. (1996). How Australian social policy neglects environments. Australian Journal of Soil and Water Conservation, 9: 3-9.
Dhote, J., Ingoleb, S. and Chavhana, A., 2012. REVIEW ON WASTEWATER TREATMENT TECHNOLOGIES. International Journal of Engineering Research & Technology (IJERT) ISSN: 2278-0181, Vol. 1(Issue 5).
Ghisi Enedir and Ferreira Daniel F. (2007). Potential for potable water savings by using rainwater and greywater in a multi-storey residential building in southern Brazil, Building and Environment, Volume 42, Issue 7, Pages 2512-2522, ISSN 0360-1323. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.buildenv.2006.07.019.
Janani T., Sudarsan J. S., and Prasanna K., (2019). "Grey water recycling with corn cob as an adsorbent", AIP Conference Proceedings 2112, 020181. https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5112366
Johnson, D., Deterding, S., Kuhn, K.A., Staneva, A., Stoyanov, S. and Hides, L., 2016. Gamification for health and wellbeing: A systematic review of the literature. Internet interventions, 6, pp.89-106.
Khan M. Nasiruddin, Wahab M. Farooq, Characterization of chemically modified corncobs and its application in the removal of metal ions from aqueous solution, Journal of Hazardous Materials, Volume 141, Issue 1, 2007, Pages 237-244, ISSN 0304-3894. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhazmat.2006.06.119.
Maimon Adi, Friedler Eran, Gross Amit (2014). Parameters affecting greywater quality and its safety for reuse, Science of The Total Environment, Volume 487, Pages 20-25, ISSN 0048-9697. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2014.03.133.
Metcalf and Eddy, Inc. (1991) “Wastewater Engineering”: Treatment Disposal and Reuse, third edition. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Metcalf and Eddy, Inc. (2003) “Wastewater Engineering: Treatment and Reuse,” Fourth edition.: McGraw-Hill, New York.
Morin-Crini N., Crini G. (eds) (2017) Contaminated industrial water. PUFC, Besançon, pp 513.
Nethaji S., Sivasamy A., Mandal A.B. (2013). Preparation and characterization of corn cob activated carbon coated with nano-sized magnetite particles for the removal of Cr (VI), Bioresource Technology, Volume 134, Pages 94-100, ISSN 0960-8524. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biortech.2013.02.012.
Vafakhah S., Bahrololoom M.E., Bazarganlari R., Saeedikhani M., (2014). Removal of copper ions from electroplating effluent solutions with native corn cob and corn stalk and chemically modified corn stalk. Journal of Environmental Chemical Engineering.
Vaughan Trivette, Chung W Seo, Wayne E Marshall (2001). Removal of selected metal ions from aqueous solution using modified corncobs, Bioresource Technology, Volume 78, Issue 2, Pages 133-139, ISSN 0960-8524, https://doi.org/10.1016/S0960-8524(01)00007-4.
Zhang, Y., Ghaly, A. E. & Li, B. (2012). Physical Properties of Corn Residues. American Journal of Biochemistry and Biotechnology, 8(2), 44-53. https://doi.org/10.3844/ajbbsp.2012.44.53
Zumdahl, Steven S. (2021, February 2). Water. Encyclopedia Britannica. https:www.britannica.com/science/water
Last updated: Jan 04, 2022 12:26 PM
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