DELHI PRIVATE SCHOOL, DUBAI

CHEMISTRY RARE
WATER PURIFICATION SYSTEM

A research document on importance of water and a cost effective,

eco-friendly and simple way to purify water.

Water an essential commodity

Water-a liquid substance that covers 71% of our planets surface,
is one of the major constituent of all organisms on this planet.
Water is the one of the prime elements responsible for the
formation of life on this planet.
Our body contains almost 75% of water in it, an average of 42
liters in it, and with loss of only 2 liters we begin to experience
dizziness, dehydration and fatigue.
This shows how important
water is for us and every
other living organism. It
helps our bodies function
properly. The chemical
formula of water is H2O. It
is one of the few elements
that are present on the
surface of our planet in all
three forms, that is solid
liquid and in gaseous state.
Water is the only liquid that
can dissolve almost any
other liquid solute in it and
is hence known as the
universal solvent.
This makes it a very
important substance for our daily use, as well as in the factories,
and is also used to facilitate transportation and cooling and plays
an important role in the world economy.

Why is water such an important

issue?
Water is needed for our everyday routines, be it for drinking or
for cleaning ourselves or clothes and utensils.
Safe drinking water is essential to humans and other life forms
even though it provides no proteins or carbohydrates. Even
though our planet has two thirds of its surface covered with water
not all of it can be directly used. Most of the water is present in
the seas and oceans and is highly saline. Out of the water
available only around 3% of it is directly usable, and is found in
the form of groundwater or freshwater from the glaciers.
Access to safe drinking water has improved over the last decades
in almost every part of the world, but approximately one billion
people still lack access to safe water and over 2.5 billion lack
accesses to adequate sanitation. There is a clear correlation
between
access
to
safe
water
and
gross
domestic
produce. However, some observers have estimated that by 2025
more than half of the world population will be facing water-based
vulnerability. A report, issued in November 2009, suggests that by
2030, in some developing regions of the world, water demand will
exceed supply by 50%. Water plays an important role in the world
economy, as it functions as a solvent for a wide variety of
chemical substances and facilitates industrial cooling and
transportation.
Unlike our ancestors who used to revere and worship water and
did their best to conserve it, the recent generations have become
more ignorant, which is an effect of want for a more luxurious
lifestyle.
The water that we have is also facing the threat of pollution and
contamination, which makes it less usable for us, which endangers
our survival on this planet.

It has been stated by many that future wars that could take place
would be in the name of water, because the one who has control
over water has the control over life.

Why is water purification

important?
Our drinking water today, the so called pure mineral water is far
from being pure as it contains many different chemicals which
over long term consumptions can have serious effects on our body.
Also a few of the disinfectants used to kill the microorganisms, are
purposely left in the water to prevent further contaminations. Also
by purifying water instead of buying bottled water helps the
environment, as it helps to reduce the usage of plastic which is not
biodegradable.
We can also save a lot of money by investing in a water purifying
system which we can use for a long time.
But there have recent innovations which are very economical and
very eco-friendly that can be used to help solve our problem of
water scarcity and contamination. Here is an example of one.

The low cost

bio-adsorbent
MATERIALS REQUIRED: CORN COBS ( sun dried for at
least 2 weeks)
Vertically cut strands of corn
cobs
Small pieces of corn cobs
Grounded corn cobs
Corn cob charcoal
FINE SAND
5 BOTTLES OF 2 LITRE CAPACITY
A STAND WITH 5 HOLDERS
TUBES TO TRANSPORT WATER FROM ONE BOTTLE TO THE OTHER
CONTAINER TO COLLECT WATER

THE METHOD
Cut open the closed ends of the bottles, only two thirds of the
bottled are required. Make a hole on the caps of each bottle just
enough for the tubes to pass through. Fit the bottles in the each
holder , and starting from the top , fill the first bottle with the
vertically cut corn cobs , the second with the smaller sized pieces
of corn cobs, the third with the corn cob charcoal , the fourth with
the powdered cobs and the fifth with cleaned fine sand. Keep a
container below this apparatus to collect the water.
Once you have made sure there are no holes or pores in the
bottles,
Slowly pour the contaminated water, can be pond water or hard
water, to the first bottle. If the water is dirty you will see that, as
the water passes from the first bottle to the second bottle, it has
become much clearer than what it was. This process takes about
30 minutes,
If you have poured around 1 2 liters of water.
This is how the process takes place If the water contains suspended impurities they will be
collected/absorbed in the two bottles containing the vertically cut
cobs and small cut pieces of cobs.
If there are colored substances present in the water such as dyes or
ink,

they will be absorbed by the charcoal present in the third bottle

and any gasoline waste or oil substances present in the water will
be absorbed by the powdered cobs.
Once it is done the water collected in the container, will be rid of
more than 90% of the impurities present in it and is suitable to be
used for cleaning, nothing and even drinking after boiling it.

WHY CORN?

In this simple purifying system, corn is used because it found to

have high rigidity, porosity and mechanical strength. Hence,
contaminants like oxides of salts, detergents, suspended particles,
coloreddyes, oil and grease get adsorbed in the surface of the corn
cobs. Corn also has the ability to easily adsorb chemical toxicants
both organic and inorganic. Other important characteristics are
Cost effective
Reusable
Easily available
Eco friendly
No skill required to use it
It is an AGRICULTURAL WASTE

SELF RFLECTION
The realization how important is to use purified water in our
everyday life has prompted me to choose this topic. The core idea
of my research his to develop a methodology to purify water in a
sustainable way as it not only serves the purpose of improving
the health and hygiene but also to protect our environment . Thus
have come up with the idea of use of corn cobs, which is an easily
available agricultural waste and easily accessible for people of
middle or lower economical classes too for setting up a safe
system of drinking water at home, in a cost effective way.
What I have learned from this research work is that the all the
solutions to our problems regarding nature can be obtained from
nature itself, and we must use it protect and better our planet
I feel that this piece of work will be quite informational and
interesting to the reader. What I enjoyed the most while doing this
research was finding the needed information, and then compiling
them together.
This work reveals me as an avid learner who tries to resolve the
issues in real life situations.
I want people to notice that there are natural, economical ways
which we can devise from our surroundings to improve the
water hygiene and thus upgrade our overall life style.

Bibliography
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www. Googlesciencefair.com
www.wikipedia.com
www.laleva.cc/environment/water.html
www.watertechonline.com
Images from Google