IJRET: International Journal of Research in Engineering and Technology

eISSN: 2319-1163 | pISSN: 2321-7308

ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
A LOW COST WATER TREATMENT BY USING A NATURAL
COAGULANT
S.V. Maruti Prasad1, B. Srinivasa Rao2
1, 2

Department of Basic Sciences & Humanities, Aditya Institute of Technology and Management, Tekkali, Srikakulam
District, Andhra Pradesh, INDIA,[email protected]; [email protected]

Abstract
Ground water is fresh water located in the core space of soil and rocks and water is essential for the survival of human beings. In
addition to food, shelter and clothing, water is one of our basic human needs and lack of potable water is a major cause of death and
disease in our world. Now a days due to rapid industrialization even in rural areas, water become contaminated. Presently there are
no appropriate low cost methods available for removal of water contaminants from drinking water. There are a variety of
purification methods of drinking water which are very costly and those methods cannot serve a common man effectively. The purpose
of this study is to provide information on low cost household water treatment using seeds of the Drum stick tree. Present study deals
with the suitability of coagulation-flocculation process using Moringa Oleifera seeds as natural coagulant for purification of water
for drinking purpose. In present study various does of Moringa Oleifera seed powder like 50, 100 and 150 mg/litre were taken and
checked for the efficiency dose for various water samples. After treatment of water samples with Morigna Oleifera seed powder were
analyzed for the parameters like Turbidity and pH. There is an appreciable change in these parameters and the values are within the
range of W.H.O. standards. Application of this low cost Moringa Oleifera seeds is recommended for eco-friendly, non-toxic,
simplified water treatment where rural people living in extreme poverty are presently drinking highly turbid and contaminated water.

Keywords: Drumstick (Moringa Oleifera), Natural coagulant, water samples, absorbent, coagulant.
---------------------------------------------------------------------***-----------------------------------------------------------------------INTRODUCTION:
Drumsticks are consumed almost all over India.
The
important traditional use of drumsticks that not a lot of people
know of water purification what do we do when we get turbid
water from taps? We generally boil it, sediment the larger
particles and then filter the water using some cloth. This is
how it is done in most lower class and even in some middle
class homes. However, this wastes lot of cooking gas which is
a privilege in most Indian homes. Our ancestors had a simple
solution to the problem of water filtration - adding a little bit
of powder obtained from drumstick seeds. In a matter of
minutes, the drumstick particles bind to the dirt and sediment
the dirt down. This process also modifies the other parameters
like pH, conductivity and hardness of water.
Fig.1 Moringa Oleifera Tree
In this present study an attempt has been made to check how
Moringa Oleifera powder changes various properties of
drinking water in rural industrially developed areas, so that the
water is suitable to drink.

Fig.2 Moringa Oleifera Seeds

2. MATERIALS AND METHODS:

2.1 Materials
Moringa Oleifera Seed Powder, water samples collected from
Vamsadhara Canal Water (Sample-1), Well water at
Ravivalasa Village (Sample-2) near
Tekkali, Srikakulam
District an industrially developed area where the main sources

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IJRET: International Journal of Research in Engineering and Technology

for drinking water are wells and Ground water at AITAM
Engineering College, Tekkali (Sample-3) which is a
residential area about 4000 students are drinking water every
day.

2.2 Method:
Good quality Moringa oleifera seeds are taken and removed its
wings and coat from their seeds. Fine powder was prepared
by using mortar and pestle and this powder was directly
used as coagulant. Water samples were collected from
Vamsadhara Canal Water (Sample-1), Industrial Area well
water at Ravivalasa Village (Sample-2)and Ground water at
AITAM Engineering College, Tekkali, (Sample-3), for the
study purpose. Water is treated by adding of MoringaOleifera
Seed powder directly. The water quality parameters were
checked before and after treatment of M.Oleifera. Doses of
seed powder were selected as 50, 100 and 150 mg/litre for
treatment.

tabular forms. Canal water (Sample-1) is more turbid than

other samples Sample-2 and Sample-3. This turbidity of
Sample-1 may be continuous movement of water in the river.
Before treatment of MoringaOleifera, turbidity is 113 NTU in
Canal water and 15.5 NTU and 14.7 NTU in other samples. In
all the samples it was observed that, the adding of M.O. Seed
powder, decreases the turbidity with increasing doses.

The coagulant was mixed with three water samples

individually and kept on the mechanical shaker for 45 min at
110 -120 rpm. The settling time was 1-2 hours (depending on
the water turbidity of different samples). After sedimentation,
supernatant water is separated and the same is taken for test.
The water quality parameters were checked before and after
the treatment and the efficiency dose of Moringaoleifera seed
powder was determined.

Fig3&4 decreasing of turbidity with increasing doses of

M.O.Powder
Table-2: Turbidity of all three samples Before and After
treatment with M.O. Seed powder

3. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION:

Sample

3.1 Colour

1
2
3

Samples 1 and 2 under study have faint brown colour before

treatment with MoringaOleifera seed powder. After adding
different doses of Moringa to the sample removes colour and
the samples are became colorless. This suggests that the
MoringaOleifera seeds show absorbent properties. Good
clarification is obtained if a small cloth bag filled with the
powder seeds of Moringa are swirled round with turbid water.
These above observations can show from TABLE-1.

eISSN: 2319-1163 | pISSN: 2321-7308

Before
Treatment
113
15.5
14.7

After Treatment
50mg/L 100mg/L
66
44
9.2
8.8
9.4
9.2

150mg/L
43
8.7
8.9

In Samples-2 and 3, it was observed that, the turbidity

decrement reaches about uniform for all the added doses. In
Sample-1 i.e.,Vamsadhara Canal water the decrement in
turbidity is prominent and uniform after adding
MoringaOliefera dose of 100mg/litre.

Table-1: Colour of samples 1 & 2 before and after treatment

with M.O.Seed powder

Turbidity of Vamsadhara Canal Water at Ravivalasa Village

Sample
1
2

Before
Treatment
Faint
brown
Faint
brown

After Treatment
50mg/L
100mg/L
Colourless Colourless

150mg/L
Colourless

Colourless

Colourless

Colourless

Turbidity (NTU)

120
100
80
60

Turbidity

40
20
0
0

50

100

150

Before and After Treatment with Moringa

3.2 Turbidity
The variation of turbidity in the samples after adding
MoringaOleifera Seeds are shown in the graphs and also

Graph1

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IJRET: International Journal of Research in Engineering and Technology

eISSN: 2319-1163 | pISSN: 2321-7308

that before treatment the pH was 6.3 show acidic properties.

After treatment with M.O.Powder, pH was increased to 7.43 at
50mg/L dose but gradually decreased to 7.35 and 7.19 by
adding of M.O.powder as 100 mg/L and 150mg/L
respectively. After treatment the range of pH in Sample-1 was
7.43 to 7.19 and it is within the limit of W.H.O. Standards.

Graph2

The recommended acceptable range of pH for drinking water

specified by W.H.O. was 6.0 to 8.0. (W.H.O. 2006). The
treatments gave a pH range of 7.57 to 7.19 which falls within
the reducing trends on the concentration of the dosing
solutions were increased. In some doses pH increases with
increasing concentrations of Moringa as coagulant. It was
reported that the action of M.O. as a coagulant lies in the
presence of water soluble cationic proteins in the seeds. This
suggests that in water, the basic amino acids present in the
protein of Moringa would accept a proton from water resulting
the release of a hydroxyl group making the solution basic
(Olayemi A.B. et al., 1994)
Table3: pH of all three samples before and after treatment
with M.O.Seed powder

The above observation may be due to an improvement in the

flock size and flock was settled rapidly. The overdosing
resulted in the saturation of the polymer bridge sites and
caused destabilization of the destabilized particles due to
insufficient number of particles to form more inter-particle
bridges. The high positive charge and small size suggest that
the main destabilization mechanism may could be adsorption
and charge neutralization. It was found that 90-99% of
turbidity in treated water was removed by using M. oleifera
seed powder. (Bina B., et al., 2010). These studies are
confirmed that the seeds are highly effective in removing
suspended particles from water with medium to high levels of
turbidity (Moringa seeds are less effective at treating water
with low levels of turbidity)

6.3

150mg/L
7.19

7.4

7.57

7.56

7.44

6.65

7.35

7.26

7.15

Before
Treatment

pH of Vamsadhara Canal water at Ravivalasa Village

pH

Graph3

After Treatment
50mg/L 100mg/L
7.43
7.35

Sample

7.6
7.4
7.2
7
6.8
6.6
6.4
6.2
6
5.8
5.6

pH

3.3 PH

100

150

Graph4
pH of Industrial Area well water at Ravivalasa Village
7.6
7.55
7.5

pH

During the present study, treatment of Moringa Oleifera seed

powder was given to ground water (Sample 1 and 3) samples
in different doses. During the analysis, it was observed that
after treatment with Moringa Seed powder, pH was increased
for 50mg/L and it was decreased for 100mg/L, 150mg/L doses
for the above samples. After treatment the pH range was 7.57
to 7.44 in Sample-2 and 7.35 to 7.15 in Sample-3. In Sample1 and 3 the water was acidic in nature before treatment and it
was converted to the basic nature after treatment.

50

Before and After Treatment with Moringa

7.45

pH

7.4
7.35
7.3
0

50

100

150

Before and After Treatment with Moringa

Treatment of MoringaOleifera seed powder was given to

Canal water (Sample-1) in different doses. It was observed

Graph5

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IJRET: International Journal of Research in Engineering and Technology

pH of Ground water at AITAM Engg. College, Tekkali

7.6
7.4

pH

7.2
7

pH

6.8
6.6
6.4
6.2
0

50

100

150

Before and After Treatment with Moringa

Graph6

CONCLUSIONS
The results obtained show that the powder from seed kernels
of M. oleifera contains some coagulating properties and acts
as a flocculent, absorbent for the treatment of drinking water
at loading doses of 50 mg/L, 100 mg/L and 150 mg/L and
above. It reduces the turbidity after treatment. This lends
support to earlier findings of the use of powder processed
from Moringa seeds as a coagulant in water purification
system. Considering the fact that Moringa coagulum can be
locally produced, its use in water purification should be
encouraged. This is likely to reduce the high cost of the
current water treatment systems. The seeds of M.Oleifera
exhibited the fastest turbidity and colour removal potential.
These studies have also confirmed that the seeds are highly
effective in removing suspended particles from water with
medium to high levels of turbidity (Moringa seeds are less
effective at treating water with low levels of turbidity).
M.Oleifera seed is not giving any toxic effect. It is ecofriendly method of purification of water and consequently it is
being recommended for large scale water treatment use in the
rural industrially developed area where no facilities are
available for the treatment of drinking water.

eISSN: 2319-1163 | pISSN: 2321-7308

[4]Olayemi A.B. and Alabi, R.O. Studies on traditional water

purification using M. oleifera seed, African study
monographs, 15, 101-109 (1994)
[5]Olsen A., Water research , 1987, 21 (3): 517-522.
[6]Suleyman A. Muyibi and Lilian M. Evison, Moringa
oleifera seeds for softening hard water, Department of Civil
Engineering, University of Newcastle upon Tyne, Newcastle
upon Tyne NEI 7RU, England, Wat. Res. 29(4), 1099-1105
(1994)
[7] WHO (2006). Guideline for drinking-water quality
(electronic resources): incorporating first addendum. Vol. 1,
Recommendations,
3rd
edition
Internet:
http://www.who.int/water_sanitation_health/dwq/gdwq0506.p
df

BIOGRAPHIES:
25 years teaching and 10 years research
experience with 15 research papers on
Atmospheric Physics. Acted as Board of
Studies member for Under Graduation,
Andhra University, Department of Physics.
At present working as Professor of Physics, B.S.&H
Department, AITAM, Tekkali, Srikakulam District, Andhra
Pradesh. Acting as Board of Studies member for Department
of Physics, AITAM, Tekkali
08 years teaching experience with 02
research
papers
on
Environmental
Sciences. Acting as Board of Studies
member for Department of Chemistry in
AITAM, Tekkali
At present working as Asst. Professor of Chemistry, B.S.&H
Department, AITAM, Tekkali, Srikakulam District, Andhra
Pradesh.

REFERENCES
[1]Bina B., Mehdinejad M. H., Gunnel Dalhammer, Guna
Rajarao, M. Nikaeen and H. Movahedian Attar, Effectiveness
of Moringa oleifera coagulant protein as natural coagulant aid
in removal of turbidity and bacteria from turbid waters, World
Academy of Science, Engineering and Technology, 67, (2010)
[2]Folkard G. and Sutherland T., The use of Moringa oleifera
as a natural coagulant for water and waste water treatment,
Department of engineering, University of Leicester, UK,
(2001)
[3]Mangale S. M., Chonde S. G., Jadhav A. S., and Raut P. D.
Study of Moringa oleifera (Drumstick) seed as natural
Absorbent and Antimicrobial agent for River water treatment,
J. Nat. Prod. Plant Resour., 2012, 2 (1):89-100.

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