Fluoride removal from groundwater by technological process optimization

Abstract

Fluoride removal from aqueous solutions was studied using nanofiltration and sorption techniques which have always been best key ways to deal with water contaminated by fluoride. In this presented work, we were firstly interested on fluoridated rejected water overcoming the drawback of RO membrane process of groundwater treatment plant in Baltic region (Kretinga, Lithuania). Opoka sorbent has shown effective results of fluoride sorption with efficiency higher than 77 %. In order to understand the sorption phenomenon and to validate the results obtained, we have applied experimental data on Freundlich and Langmuir isotherms which allow us to determine isotherms parameters (KF; 1/n and KL; qmax) and to confirm the experiment. Because of the unacceptable tariff of drinking water treated by RO, defluoridation with nanofiltration method is proposed in this study as a solution which can replace reverse osmosis technique. For that, tests of nanofiltration for fluoride removal were carried out at laboratory scale by using nanofiltration flat sheet membranes (NF270 and NF90).