Comparison between activated carbon and sand filtration method for water quality enhancement: A case study

Abstract

Urbanization is regarded as the development of a country, and this process brings modernization of society with a positive impact. Nowadays, housing developments need to include green spaces towards a sustainable lifestyle. Thus, some of the developers choose to build projects near the existing recreational area or surface water environments. Hence, the transformation and expansion of residential and economic activities near waterbodies such as lakes and rivers have lowered the quality of this surface water system. Moreover, severe environmental pollution has been worsened especially in surface water located in urban areas. This study aims to determine the water quality status of Metropolitan Lake, Kuala Lumpur before and after the treatment of activated carbon and sand filtration method. Here, physical and chemical characteristics were conducted for in-situ and laboratory analysis. Temperature, pH, dissolved oxygen (DO), total dissolved solids (TDS) and turbidity of water samples were taken in-situ. Meanwhile, parameters of biochemical oxygen demand (BOD), chemical oxygen demand (COD), turbidity, total suspended solids (TSS), ammonia nitrogen (NH3-N) were determined in the laboratory. Before the treatment process, the classification of water quality index (WQI) for the sample of Metropolitan Lake, Kuala Lumpur was in class IV. However, after the two treatments of activated carbon and sand filtration, the water class of WQI has improved to class II. Thus, it is important to enhance the water quality through pre-treatment on the surface water system as this source of water is vital for water security and ecosystem surroundings.