Recycling waste soda lime glass for water purification

• Main Author: Chong, Zi Hui
• Other Authors: Zhang Hua
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: 2016
• Subjects: DRNTU::Engineering
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/66344
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

Due to the lack of research in innovative methods that are both environmentally friendly and cost effective in treating industrial wastewater, the motivation of this project is to explore better environmentally friendly and cost effective methods in purifying industrial wastewater contaminated by heavy metals. After several considerations, recycling waste soda-lime glass which is cheap and commercially available is chosen for purifying waste water as it showed great potential and effectiveness in adsorbing heavy metal ions. Adsorption capacities of metal ions by hydrothermally treated soda-lime glass powder were determined by varying the duration of hydrothermal treatment and the type of metal ions. Adsorption capacities differed due to the different morphology of glass nanoparticles after being hydrothermally treated at varying time durations. Optimal adsorption capacity is obtained by nanoflakes that are hydrothermally treated for 24 hours and adsorption is more effective for higher charged and larger sized metal ions. Further studies can be made to determine the exact mechanism of the adsorption mechanism. Even though the characterization tests conducted in this project are sufficient to prove the proposed mechanism of electrostatic attraction, possibilities of other mechanisms that are taking place prior to or concurrently or even after the proposed mechanism cannot be eliminated. The positive experimental results showed that recycling waste soda-lime glass is a good method for water purification as recycled soda-lime glass serves as a more affordable and environmentally friendly adsorbent in treating industrial wastewater contaminated with metal cations.