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Microplastic removal from treated wastewater utilizing ecofriendly biowaste adsorbent
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Finding low-cost, sustainable ways to remove microplastics from treated wastewater before it is discharged is a major challenge. This study showed that a simple adsorbent made from banana peels—an abundant agricultural waste—could remove more than 99% of microplastics from both synthetic and real treated wastewater under optimized conditions (25 minutes contact time, pH 4, 300 mg/L dose). The result demonstrates that cheap biowaste materials could offer a practical last-stage treatment option for wastewater plants, particularly in lower-income settings where expensive filtration infrastructure is unavailable.
Abstract In the present study, banana peels (biowaste) synthesis, and characterization were conducted, and utilization (for the first time) as adsorbent for microplastics removal from treated wastewater were investigated. A chain of steps of sampling, preparation, and characterization were carried out on actual treated wastewater. Banana peels were passed through some stages to synthesize the biowaste absorbent material. A set of laboratory experiments were conducted on a synthesized wastewater containing a specific concentration of microplastics in order to investigate the optimum operating conditions. Under these optimum condition (contact time = 25 min, pH value = 4, adsorbent dose = 300 mg/L), the removal rate of the microplastics particles were >99% with adsorption capacity of 0.085 mg/g. When the same operating conditions were applied on actual treated wastewater taken from wastewater treatment plant just before point of discharge to water resource, the removal rate of microplastics was 97.5% with adsorption capacity of 0.078 mg/g. In this study, for the first time, banana peels have been proven to be super effective, simple to synthesis, inexpensive, environmentally friendly and sustainable adsorbent for removing microplastics from wastewater. This mean that microplastics can be removed completely from wastewater by adding this effective biowaste adsorbent to the wastewater after the conventional treatment units of wastewater treatment plant.
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