Purification of wastewater by activated carbon prepared from dates stones of Southern Algeria

Abstract

The El-Oued region (Southern Algeria) confronted various problems of pollution, including discharges of wastewater containing pollutants into the surrounding environment without any treatment. This issue is a matter of increasing concern owing to the effects that pollutants can cause both on environment and health. Effluents polluted by organic material from several sites in the city of El-Oued are highly loaded with nonbiodegradable organic compounds, and hence required a significant effort to find economical methods to reduce this pollution. The aim of this study is the preparation and characterization of an activated carbon from lignocellulosic natural residue of waste "dates stones" from the south of Algeria (El-Oued). After the preparation of the raw material for production, we studied the characterizations of carbon (Iodine number, Methylene blue number, Morphology analysis, IR spectroscopy analysis and Cation-exchange capacity) at the beginning on the other hand we observed the effectiveness of the carbon in the filter of wastewater, we measured the terms: chemical oxygen demand (COD), biochemical oxygen demand after 5 days (BOD5), total nitrogen (TN), total phosphorus (TP), Total Suspended Solids (TSS), turbidity, conductivity, pH and temperature.