Plate Settler Spacing

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Introduction

This research is focused on a deeper understanding of the sedimentation process so that plants can remove dirt particles from dirty water as efficiently as possible, allowing for successful chlorination of the outgoing water. Currently the plants all use lamella, which are corrugated parallel plates that decrease the distance that a floc must fall to be settled out. To make things simpler for a lab, we use tube settlers of various diameters, and experiment with different flow rates and turbidities, because these things fluctuate often in the plants in Honduras based on the season.

One of the main reasons for this focus is that sedimentation is the only process in which particulates are actually removed from the water. Flocculation and rapid mix may be working well, but if the particles are not being settled out, people will still be drinking dirty water. Low turbidity water is not only aesthetically pleasing, it's also safer because the disease causing pathogens are more likely to be exposed and killed when the water is chlorinated. AguaClara has had the goal of 1 NTU water since its beginning, and the Plate Settler Spacing team has been able to accomplish this in the lab, but now is trying to see how this can be transferred to our future plants in Honduras. Sedimentation is also the limiting factor for the height requirement of the plants, so if we can find a way to produce the same results with a smaller amount of space, the plant cost will decrease significantly.

Subteam Semester Goals and Future Challenges
Weekly Subteam Progress.
Research Plan

[Summer 2009 Midterm Wiki]

Experimental Methods and Results

Summer 2009

[Experiments varying the Alum Concentration|]

Spring 2009

Experiments with Flow Rates and Inner Tube Diameters

This section contains two related experiments. The first experiment varies flow rates and the inner diameter of the tube settler. From these results, the ideal L/d ratio is identified and held constant for a certain flow rate and inner diameter by varying the tube length.