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Developing a Water Treatment Filter by Integrating Slow Sand Filtration Technology with Polypropylene Nonwoven and Activated Carbon and Testing Its Performance

Water Conservation Science and Engineering volume 7, pages 351–361 (2022)Cite this article

Abstract

Scarcity of fresh drinking water has become a major concern in various parts of the world recently. Therefore, this study aimed to develop a sustainable polymer (polypropylene) and carbon (activated carbon from coconut shell) based water treatment filter. The filter was made by integrating polypropylene nonwoven fabric on the top of a two-inch layer of activated carbon and the traditional slow sand filter. The filter showed a significant reduction in turbidity, total dissolved solids (TDS), biological oxygen demand (BOD), pH, and concentration of heavy metals (HM) in the water samples collected from Turag River, Bangladesh. The reduction efficiencies were more than 85%. The higher value of reducing heavy metals, TDS, BOD, and pH might be explained by a higher particle retention and adsorption capacity of the filter due to the notable higher specific surface area of activated carbon and the pore size of the polypropylene filtration layer. The concentrations of lead, zinc, iron, potassium, magnesium, calcium, and copper were examined in which the filter showed a promising result; however, the removal efficiency of other potential heavy metals is yet to be tested.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Textile Engineering, International University of Scholars, Banani, Dhaka, Bangladesh

    Mohsin Uddin

  2. Department of Textile & Fashion Management, Institute of Science, Trade & Technology, Dhaka, Bangladesh

    Salman Enayet Chowdhury

  3. Department of Apparel Engineering, Bangladesh University of Textiles, Tejgaon, Dhaka, Bangladesh

    Sazid Elahi

Authors
  1. Mohsin Uddin
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  2. Salman Enayet Chowdhury
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  3. Sazid Elahi
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Contributions

MU conceived of the presented idea. He developed the prototype and analyzed its performance with SEC. SEC and SE verified the analytical methods. All authors discussed the results and contributed to the final manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Mohsin Uddin.

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The authors declare no competing interests.

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Uddin, M., Chowdhury, S.E. & Elahi, S. Developing a Water Treatment Filter by Integrating Slow Sand Filtration Technology with Polypropylene Nonwoven and Activated Carbon and Testing Its Performance. Water Conserv Sci Eng 7, 351–361 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s41101-022-00146-z

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s41101-022-00146-z

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