Field Evaluation of the Effectiveness of Surfactant Modified Zeolite and IronOxideCoated Sand for Removing Viruses and Bacteria from Ground Water Academic Article uri icon

abstract

  • Field experiments were conducted to evaluate the efficiency of iron-oxide-coated sand (ICS) and surfactant modified zeolite (SMZ) to remove viruses and bacteria from ground water. The reactive media were employed as filter packs of a pumping well that withdrew sewage effluent from a constructed wetland at a rate of 0.72 L/min. The contact time of the pumped water with the filter pack (10 cm thick) was about two minutes. Upgradient of the pumping well, the sewage effluent was spiked with MS-2 bacteriophage and E. coli. While the employed ICS filter pack failed to remove viruses and bacteria to a significant degree, the SMZ filter pack removed more than 99% of the viruses and 100% of E. coli from the ground water while fresh. In an additional field experiment using the same configuration but leaving the filter pack in place for more than five months, the SMZ filter pack was still removing 100% of E. coli, but failed to reduce virus numbers to a significant degree.

published proceedings

  • Groundwater Monitoring & Remediation

author list (cited authors)

  • SchulzeMakuch, D., Bowman, R. S., Pillai, S. D., & Guan, H.

citation count

  • 23

complete list of authors

  • Schulze‐Makuch, Dirk||Bowman, Robert S||Pillai, Suresh D||Guan, Huade

publication date

  • November 2003

publisher