Boron removal from shat al-Arab river water using electrocoagulation

Abstract EN

Shat Al-Arab is a rive r located at the south of Iraq.

Boron conc entration has increased significantly rec ently due to the drought season which make s water from the Arabian Gulf pour into Shat Al-Arab.

Boron concentration, as high as 5 mg/l, was detected in this river.

This is 10 time s the allowable drinking water concentration for boron according to WHO and the Iraqi drinking wate r guidelines, i.e.

0.5 mg/l.

Experiments were conducted to determine the ability of electrocoagulation tec hnique to reduc e boron concentrations in sy nthetic water of 5 mg Boron/l and c onductivity of 2000 µS/cm to the required level in drinking water.

Experimental setup was prepared to determine the effects of seve ral ope rating parameters on the optimum operation for the electrocoagulation.

In addition, the te chnique was c ompare d with c hemical coagulation, using Poly -Aluminum-Chloride, Aluminum Sulphate, and Ferric Chloride.

The experiments revealed that chemical coagulation has a very low efficiency (about 12%) that renders it unsuitable as a pretre atment for existing (or for the future) desalination units.

On the other hand, electrocoagulation e xperiments showed a maximum boron removal efficiency of 40% at a current density of 5 mA/cm 2 , operating time of 30 minutes, and pH of 8.