Perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) is a very common pollutant in chemical industries and consumer products. It is resistant to common wastewater treatment processes due to its strong stability. PFOA is a health hazard as exposure leads to serious health issues that impact humans and the environment. This project had two major components. The first component is to synthesize, characterize and analyze an effective activated carbon for the adsorption of PFOA. In this project, the activated carbon was derived from coconut. Two procedures were utilized in the synthesis of the activated carbon. For the first method, we pyrolyze after mixing the carbon with phosphoric acid and the second method is to pyrolyze the carbon before mixing with phosphoric acid. The activated carbon was characterized with Brunauer–Emmett–Teller (BET) surface area analyzer. Then we used analytical methods of conductivity and a Total Organic Carbon Analyzer to determine the adsorption capacity of the activated carbon. The second component is the design of a wastewater treatment plant containing a tertiary carbon adsorption step for the removal of PFOA. The design used a basis of 1 million gallons per day as the influent, which is equivalent to a small municipal system. The dimensions of each unit operation of the wastewater treatment plant will be calculated and the design will include an economic and waste analysis.
Authors: Clara Guerra, Jeff McCain, Hao Chen
Faculty Advisor: Dr. Catherine Almquist, Department of Chemical, Paper, and Biomedical Engineering
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