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During the Fall 2008 semester I have worked on the Floating Dissolved Air Flotation of Flocs Team. This group is a subsection of the Research Team. I am the only member of this sub team so all of the work done on the project was my work. The first thing I did was consult with the Cornell students in Honduras to get a better understanding of the problem. Once I had a relatively good grasp on the situation I began performing literature searches to find out information on other situations that have had an issue with particles floating to the surface in a system. Unfortunately I was not able to find very much pertinent information during those searches. I have since made another attempt to locate papers on research performed to explore the process and causes of floc rising to the surface of the water in the tank and found some useful documents which I am still reviewing. After the original unsuccessful literature searches a conversation with Paul McClaskey brought up the idea of using an air-water separator. These apparatuses are used for water heaters that have a similar issue with particles rising in the tank. After further research I decided that this was not a practical solution for the AguaClara water treatment plants. My next course of action was to consult with my professor of Physical and Chemical water properties, Prof Gosset, about the current issue. He made several suggestions as to the cause of infusion of gas into the floc particles:
1) That the Alum was causing the water to become too acidic thus subsequently causing CO2 bubbles to form in the water. The solution to this problem would be the simple addition of a basic chemical. However, after Tamar and John took pH readings on the influent and effluent (Plant Entrance Tank: pH = 6.77, Plant Exit Tank: pH = 6.50) it became apparent that this was not the case in Tamara.
2) A significant temperature difference between the influent and the effluent could also increase the amount of air in the water but Tamara does not appear to have that problem.
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During the Spring 2009 semester I have been the team leader of the Floating Dissolved Air Flotation of Flocs Team. This semester the Floating Floc team broke into two sub-sub teams: Floating Floc Aeration Method and the Floating Floc Fluidized Bed Method. I am working with the aeration group which is focused on the use of aeration of the water in the grit chamber to reduce the dissolved oxygen (DO) content of the water. Thus far I have worked hard to solve the problems we have encountered in the design and operation of the mini grit chamber/entrance pipe and at this point Tanya and I have come very close to solving all of the problems (hopefully). The experiments we have performed have not had the results that we had hoped for, but it is possible that problem actually lies in the testing DO probe being under different pressures rather than the concept in general.
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