Investigating the Efficiency of Locally Available Mucilage Plant Extract for Reducing Hydrocarbon Materials in Water

Abstract

The study aimed to examine plant extract prepared from three species including Leucaena seeds, Conocarpus leaves and Moringa seeds, those compared alum as natural coagulants for reducing chemical oxygen demand (COD) of domestic sewage water. Pure clay material was added gradually to the sewage water then mixed continually to obtain a final form of turbid sewage water. The experiment's work was carried out using a jar test device, each plant extract was used to reduce COD in sewage water which comprised five doses (10, 25, 50, 75 and 100) ppm with five levels of pH 3, 5, 7, 9 and 11. Results revealed that there was the highest decrease of COD percentages through the experiment process using three plant extracts compared alum which was (65, 66, 64, and 55)% at concentrations of (50, 50, 75 and 25) ppm for three natural coagulants and alum respectively, at Ph 9, also indicated acceptable changing pH and EC using natural coagulant application.

Keywords

• natural coagulants
• plant extract
• alum
• cod
• water turbidity