Raw Water Treatment from Selected Areas in Kelantan Using Coconut Shell Derived Nanomagnetic Adsorbent Composite (CS-NMAC)

Abstract

The availability of clean water is a longstanding problem in the state of Kelantan, causing consumers to use alternative sources of raw water, such as rivers and groundwater. However, the quality of alternative sources of raw water is a concern due to turbidity problem. This research aims to develop a coconut shell derived nanomagnetic adsorbent composite (CS-NMAC) to purify contaminated raw water collected from Tanah Merah, Pasir Mas, and Jeli, in Kelantan. In this work, comparisons between the synthesized CS-NMAC and a commercial activated carbon (AC) revealed that the pore number for the CS-NMAC is f 43.3% higher than AC, while the presence of Fe-O peak at 536.98 cm-1 affirms the presence of magnetic properties on the surface of CS-NMAC. The maximum uptake capacity (Qmax) of CS-NMAC (3.79 mg/g) is higher than AC (1.76 mg/g). The purification of raw water sample at 200 rpm, 37 minutes, 27°C, and 0.04 g of CS-NMAC removed 94.26% of turbidity while Cd, Pb, Fe, Mn, and Hg were purified as following sorption capacity: 0.047, 0.02, 14.87, 0.4, and 0.004 mg/g respectively. These findings support CS-NMAC as a potent solution for improving access to clean treated water from alternative water sources