Treatment of simulated pharmaceutical industry wastewater using coagulation and flocculation method

• Main Authors: Alvarez, Danica Marie O., Pinili, Arnold M., Saniel, Maria Loren Melanie G.
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Animo Repository 2007
• Subjects: Sewerage; Sewage > Purification; Sewage disposal > Law and legislation; Water products; Water reuse; Chemical Engineering
• Online Access: https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/etd_bachelors/8808
• Institution: De La Salle University

Pharmaceutical industry wastewater has high concentrations of chemical oxygen demand (COD), total dissolved solids (TDS) and total suspended solids (TSS). A high concentration of COD will decrease the oxygen in the body of water where it was disposed and a high TDS will cause the water to exhibit hardness. This requires extensive treatment before they are released back to the environment. In this study, simulated pharmaceutical industry wastewater using antibiotic tablets was treated using coagulation and flocculation method. The primary purpose of this study is to demonstrate how effective and beneficial the coagulation-flocculation method in treating the wastewater in terms of the reduction of COD, TSS, TDS. Effects of agitation rate, pH adjustments, coagulant and flocculant dosages were analyzed by setting the condition of the parameters in the following combinations: constant dosage of alum (coagulant) and excelfloc (flocculant) with varying pH and constant pH with varying dosages of coagulant and flocculant using jar test apparatus. Reaction kinetics was also considered to determine the order of the reaction. Results showed that at agitation rate of 200 RPM for coagulation and 20 RPM for flocculation, reductions of 39.0663% for COD, 78.9474% for TSS and 11.4864% for TDS were obtained. As for the reaction kinetics, the order of the reaction cannot be determined from the experiment and maybe non-elementary.