Assessment of Point-of-Use Membrane-Based Drinking Water Appliance for Local Community

Abstract

Developing countries, such as Indonesia, has abundance of water resources, either fresh and salty water. However, improved drinking water is still uneasy to access. While centralized water treatment facilities do not provide a ready use drinking water due to expensive cost and extensive on-site process or distribution system, bottled water generally accepted for daily consumption. Nevertheless, bottled drinking water is significantly expensive and the left over used plastic bottle become major contributor for plastic pollution. A mobile and compact point-of-use drinking water treatment appliance is a pivotal answer to provide clean, healthy and low cost drinking water and user-friendly instrument for low income households and communities. This paper reported design and assessment of the device. Water qualities were measured for biological, physicals and chemicals properties, and met the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) 5667-5: 2006, for instance nitrate content was decreased from 33.36 mg/L to 4.6 mg/L; nitrite content decreased from 0.1169 mg/L to 0.0248 mg/L; ammonia content decreased from 0.2693mg/L to 0.16 mg/L; manganese content decreased from 0.015 mg/L to 0.0136 mg/L and fluoride content decreased from 4.721 mg/L to <0.00625 mg/L. Long term application of 30 days operation was also reported. The volumetric flowrates were stable at 16-22 L/min and the hydraulic pressure were constant at about 0.6 bar behind UF membrane, indicated very low fouling observed. The design is finally could be adapted and implemented in any local and low income communities worldwide, to maintain the supply of healthy and safe drinking water.