Decontamination of water through advanced oxidation process

Water is an essential need for the survival of human beings. Currently, 844 million people do not  have access to clean drinking water and about 1000 children die daily due to various water-related diseases. In 2010, the United Nations General Assembly recognized the supply of clean drinking wa

Project Title

Decontamination of water through advanced oxidation process

Project Area of Specialization

Electrical/Electronic Engineering

Project Summary

Water is an essential need for the survival of human beings. Currently, 844 million people do not  have access to clean drinking water and about 1000 children die daily due to various water-related diseases. In 2010, the United Nations General Assembly recognized the supply of clean drinking water as a basic human right. Later in 2015, the same assembly announced 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) to “end poverty in all its forms” where goal 6 aims to “ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all”. Globally about 70% of freshwater is used in the agriculture sector to meet food requirements, 20 % for the industrial sector, and only 10% for domestic usage. With the rise in global population, the demand for fresh water is also increasing whereas the supply is declining to cause a divergence in the demand and supply. Half a billion peoples are facing water scarcity in different countries of the world and this number will increase up to six times in the coming decade. Water disinfection processes are categorized into physical and chemical processes. In the physical water disinfection process, the pathogens are killed through heating, ultraviolet radiations (UV), or separated through membrane filtration. While these methods have minimal disinfection byproducts, their key limitations are related to membrane fouling, high power consumption, and recontamination of water after a certain time due to the lack of reservoir effects.Chemical processes such as chlorination and ozonation are more effective however the formation of excessive byproducts is a serious concern for public health. Our solution to this problem is ‘Decontamination of Water through Advanced Oxidation process with automation’ that is much better and advance process of water disinfection. This is the most advanced and effective method across the whole world today. It combines all the advantages of the above-mentioned methods in a single package as it detects available pathogens quantity in the water and adjusts the required distance between aluminum electrodes through automation. It produces reactive oxygen species which are able to destroy toxic compounds and biological contamination in water. It destroys almost all organics without pollution transfer to another phase. It is very effective and economic friendly. Our project can provide maximum benefit to those areas where many people are died due to non-purified water diseases. We can also use this system in schools, colleges, universities and hospitals or in our homes.

Project Objectives

Water is a Basic Human Need. Without it, survival is not possible. Every day,2.1 billion people still wake up each morning without access to clean water. Currently,844 million people do not have access to clean drinking water and about 1000 children die daily due to various water related diseases.2.1 billion people globally do not have access to clean, safe drinking water.3.4 million people die each year from scarce and contaminated water sources. Millions of women and children spend 3-6 hours each day collecting water from distant and polluted sources. The time it takes to walk the average 3.7 miles for clean water is time not spent generating income, caring for family members, or attending school. At any given time, half of the world’s hospital beds are occupied by patients suffering from fatal diseases such as typhoid fever, cholera, dysentery and diarrhoea associated with lack of access to clean water. In most of the cities of Pakistan, the elementary source of provision is ground water supply, which contains various pathogens including many viral, bacterial, and protozoan agents causing 2.5 million deaths from endemic diarrheal disease each year. An estimated 40% of all deaths in Pakistan are caused by ingesting contaminated water. In recent years, advanced oxidation processes (AOPs) have gained considerable attention over conventional disinfection processes such as chlorination, ultraviolet disinfection, and ozonation owing to the superior performance of Advanced Oxidation process. The most recent and effective technique used for purification of water is decontamination of water through advanced oxidation process with automation. The method is found to disinfect all types of pathogens and to reduce the level of other organic and inorganic contaminants. It automatically detects pathogens, adjusts the voltage supply and kills them.

Project Implementation Method

Our Project of Decontamination of Water through Advanced Oxidation process consists of three parts, i.e., Mechanical, Electrical and Chemical. All are implemented in their ways. As far as the mechanical structure is concerned, an iron stand along with a stepper motor placed on its upper right side is used. The stand will provide the basic support to the electrodes and their distance adjustment in water. The stand contains four bearings. Two of them are fixed on left and right sides of a vertical rotating rod on the stand. The remaining two are movable and will hold stainless steel electrodes.

In chemical structure, the electrodes are placed in horizontal manner of the rotating rod. The whole stand is fixed through clips on a card board. We use insulation sheet to insulate stainless steel electrodes from the bearing and rod to avoid short circuit. Three water tanks made of acrylic sheets are used. One is water reservoir tank with total dissolved solid (TDS) sensor. Second is placed below the iron stand and electrodes are dipped into it. Water purification is done in this tank. This tank contains microbial sensors to detect pathogens and their quantity and water level sensor. The remaining tank is used to collect pure water and it contains a PH sensor. All the three tanks are connected through a electronic flow control valves.

As for the electrical part, a buck boost converter is used to increase the applied voltage (1 to 12V) up to 30 volts. The power supply can be provided by a battery, solar system or DC power supply. A PCB is deigned that will gather the components including Arduino controller which will control TDS sensor, water level sensor and PH sensor. Further an L298N motor driver is placed on PCB with Arduino controller which will operate stepper motor and rod will move. The Arduino microcontroller is connected through a wire port with PC which keeps all the sequence of the mechanism and provides instructions for the electrodes movement, voltage supply and the sensors to act accordingly the requirement. We also used joystick button to adjust electrodes position in water tank manually.

Benefits of the Project

Our project of decontamination of water through advanced oxidation process with automation has many advantages over other traditional methods for the treatment of contaminated water.

A very few of the vast benefits of the water purification by AOP are listed below:

Most efficient and effective process

Water treatments processes like heating, ultraviolet radiations (UV), or pathogens separation through membrane filtration have minimal disinfection by-products, their key limitations are related to membrane fouling, high power consumption, and recontamination of water after a certain time due to the lack of reservoir effects. Chemical processes such as chlorination and ozonation are more effective however the formation of excessive by-products is a serious concern for public health. But Our process provides solution of all these issues. It does not make any by-product neither consumes too much power. It is very efficient to treat almost all organic pollutants from water.

Pollution Reduction

The process of advanced oxidation can effectively eliminate organic compounds in aqueous phase, rather than collecting or transferring pollutants into another phase as it has high reactive rates. Therefore, it helps to reduce pollution in the environment. It is environmental friendly process since the complete reduction product of ·OH is H2O, AOPs theoretically do not introduce any new hazardous substances into the water.

Cheap to install

This system is not very expensive. Therefore, we can easily install it anywhere with necessary equipments for the supply of purified water to avoid contaminated water borne diseases and to enjoy a healthy life.

Adaptable to small scales in developing countries

As our project is environmental friendly and cheap to install, we can adopt this project’s working principles and process to install it in those underdeveloped countries where thousands of people are died every year due to water borne diseases. It will be very helpful to save their lives.

Technical Details of Final Deliverable

TDS and microbial sensing:

The power supply is provided to the system through a 12 battery or DC power supply and system operates. Buck boost converter adjusts the voltage according to requirement.  In the first step, Total dissolved sensor placed in water reservoir detects and indicates that how many milligrams of soluble solids are dissolved in water. Then water is flowed into electrode tank by using control valve. The microbial sensors detect and indicate the quantity of microbes available in the water. Water level is also controlled by water level indicator sensor.

Electrodes Spacing:

After the detection of pathogens in water, the automation is carried out through LabVIEW and Arduino IDE programming controlled by Arduino controller and PCB design. It runs the stepper motor to adjust the spacing between electrodes and tells us that how much voltage and current is required to apply across electrodes to kill pathogens. Spacing can also be adjusted manually by using joystick button. The required voltage is applied and it produces reactive oxides in water which kill all the pathogens.

Pure Water Reservoir:

The purified water is shifted into new tank through electronic flow control valve. Here a PH sensor controlled by Arduino controller detects and shows us the PH of purified water. As a result, decontaminated water is obtained all pathogens are killed. We use a pipe to remove the remaining waste water of electrodes tank.

Final Deliverable of the Project

HW/SW integrated system

Core Industry

Health

Other Industries

Energy

Core Technology

Others

Other Technologies

Sustainable Development Goals

Clean Water and Sanitation

Required Resources

If you need this project, please contact me on contact@adikhanofficial.com