Experimental and numerical study of composite filter based on Bangui clay and nut hull of palm: application to the purification of water

Abstract

The consumption of the Bangui unsafe water is at the origin of many diseases like bilharzias, amoebas, typhoid and hepatitis E. This work aims at improving sanitary conditions of water in the capital and other cities of the Central African Republic. For this reason, a composite filter, based on clay and activated carbon resulting from the nut hulls of palm, is developed in the framework of this work in order to be widely diffused to needy populations of the town of Bangui and neighbourhood to reduce the rate of diseases caused by unsafe water. The adopted method consists in doing samplings of clay and nut hull of palm followed by a physical treatment to obtain clay powders, and then in treating physicochemically to obtain active carbon powders owing to chemical and thermal activation process. The obtained results are very promising insofar as for well water taken with a turbidity of 95 NTU has a turbidity of 3.5 NTU after filtration. The suspended matter of 144 mg/L is reduced to 2 mg/L, faecal coliforms of ≫300 returned to >300 with clay’s porosity of 37.5%. The adsorption isotherm with characteristics of the coal of nut hull of palm shows a value of n = 0.69 and Kf = 0.94. Then numerical results of temperatures on the outer and inner walls of the composite filter are coherent with theoretical results.

Keywords

• clay
• active coal
• water purification
• hydrous diseases