Particle Size Optimisation of Sand to Improve Water Treatment Efficiency
More efficient treatment methods must be developed for ensuring the future availability of drinking water. The purpose of this project was to determine how particle size composition can be optimized to improve the performance of sand as a natural, inexpensive, sustainable water filtration media.
Calibrated sieves were used to selectively remove specific particle size fractions from all-purpose sand. Permeation times, together with pH and calcium concentrations of filtered water samples were used to prove that the water filtration rate of sand can be increased by 65% by removing the <150 micron particle size fraction (11.3% by weight), while maintaining pH buffering performance.