Evaluation of the potential of red soil to enhance solar disinfection of drinking water
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Date
2016-11
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Publisher
Kampala International University; School of Health Sciences
Abstract
Background: Clean drinking water in developing countries is a major challenge due to the high microbial load that makes it unsafe for human consumption, thus showing the need to develop novel technologies that would lead to increase accessibility of safe drinking water for the poor. Aim: This study to evaluate the potential of red soil in the enhancement of the solar disinfection of drinking water. Materials and Methods: Three experiments were set up, each containing 99ml of distilled water, 76 ~I of hydrogen peroxide, 50 ~I of orange 2dye. One without the photo catalyst, one with ferric oxide (400mg) and the third with red soil (800mg), the mixture was placed in a conical flask stirred with a magnetic stirrer and exposed to LED light, lemon juice and UV light. Samples were taken at different intervals i.e. 30, 60, 90 minutes, centrifuged and absorbance was taken at 483 nm using a spectrometer. Bacterial growth was conducted using mckonky agar and colony forming units were counted. Results and Discussion: The study showed that soil led to a greater decrease in absorbance in the water than in ferric oxide under LED light which would have been due to production hydroxyl radicals has been shown to have the ability to lead to disinfection of water through a reduction in bacterial growth. A reduction in pH by the actions of lemon juice led to increased degradation activity by Fe3 + showing the role of low pH in disinfection due to the reductions in bacterial growth in after exposure. On exposure to UV light, low degradation was seen due to increase in turbidity thus showing that optimum degradation is feasible in UV under less turbid conditions. Conclusion and Recommendations: •Soil enhanced solar water disinfection under optimum conditions as it was able to minimize bacterial growth. However, changes in these parameters such as pl-1, and turbidity led to decreased activity. There is need to determine the mechanism of action through which this activity is done.
Description
A research report submitted to the School of Pharmacy in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Award of a Bachelor of Pharmacy Degree of Kampala International University Western Campus, Uganda
Keywords
Potential of red soil, Solar disinfection of drinking water