Treatment of palm oil mill secondary effluent (POMSE) using ultrafiltration and nanofiltration membranes

Malaysian palm oil industry has grown rapidly over the last few decades, to becoming the world’s largest producer and exporter of palm oil. This success story however, comes with a greater challenge and equally required more sacrifices in order to maintain the tempo. In the year of 2004, it has been recorded that 26.7 million tons of solid biomass and approximately a 30 million tons of palm oil mill effluent (POME) were generated from 381 palm oil mills in Malaysia [1]. Although different kind of wastes are generated in the palm oil mills, the perceived harmful waste among all the waste generated is the palm oil mill effluent (POME) due to its associated harm if discharged into the environment untreated [2]. POME is a colloidal suspension originating from mixture of sterilizer condensate, separator sludge and hydro cyclone wastewater in a ratio of 9:15:1 respectively [3]. It is a brownish colored, thick liquid that is containing high amount of oil, solids, and grease with high Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD) and Biological Oxygen Demand (BOD) values. Table 15.1 describes the characteristic of POME obtained from Malaysian Palm Oil Board

Tahap stres dalam kalangan pensyarah kolej vokasional di Johor

Stres merupakan perkara yang boleh membawa gangguan kepada individu. Sekiranya tidak dicegah akan memberi impak kepada kesihatan dan kehidupan. Bagaimanapun ia boleh berlaku kepada sesiapa sahaja. Begitu juga dengan para guru atau pensyarah. Stres guru banyak dikaitkan dengan bebanan kerja yang berlebihan dan karenah pelajar yang membawa ketidak selesaan dalam pekerjaan. Kini, ditambah lagi dengan perubahan yang telah dialami oleh sistem pendidikan teknik dan vokasional (PTV) iaitu pembaharuan dari Sekolah Menengah Vokasional (SMV) kepada Kolej Vokasional (KV). Namun, ini telah membawa kepada corak sistem kurikulum yang sedikit sebanyak memberi tekanan kepada pensyarah kolej vokasional. Tujuan kajian ini dijalankan adalah bagi mengenal pasti tahap stres dalam kalangan pensyarah kolej vokasional di Johor. Kajian ini dijalankan secara kaedah tinjauan dengan menggunakan set kaji selidik dengan alpha Cronbach adalalah sebanyak 0.813. Seramai 255 orang pensyarah dari 7 buah kolej vokasional di Johor di pilih secara rawak sebagai responden untuk menjawab soal selidik yang telah dibina. Data analisis dianalisis secara deskriptif dan inferensi iaitu dengan menggunakan kekerapan, peratusan, ujian t-bebas dan ANOVA. Hasil daripada kajian menunjukkan bahawa tahap stres dalam kalangan responden adalah sederhana namun terdapatnya tanda-tanda stres dalam kalangan mereka. Tahap stres dalam kalangan pensyarah perempuan lebih tinggi berbanding pensyarah lelaki. Faktor perubahan sistem merupakan faktor dominan berlakunya stres dalam kalangan reponden dengan 29%, diikuti faktor bebanan kerja (23%), faktor karenah pelajar (23%), faktor hubungan interpersonal (13%) dan faktor kekangan masa dan sumber (12%). Dapatan kajian juga mendapati tidak terdapat perbezaan yang signifikan antara tahap stres dan faktor stres dengan faktor jantina, tetapi didapati terdapatnya perbezaan signifikan antara tahap stres dan faktor stres dengan lokasi kolej

Performance of nanofiltration membrane for printing wastewater treatment

Almost every manufacturing process is the major origin of wastewater with certain characteristic. Printing facility provides a wide range of waste component that is harmful to the environment and people. Those harmful waste component contains high concentration of heavy metals and dye. This paper presents one of the most promising methods to remove the heavy metals and dyes from a printing wastewater before discharging to the environment. The feasibility of commercially available NF270 membrane to treat both heavy metals and dye was thoroughly investigated. The study was carried out using a cross-flow nanofiltration membrane system at operating pressure and temperature set at 5 bar and 24 ˚C, respectively. Experimental results showed that the permeate flux of NF270 is decreased from 6.2 to 5.0 L/m2 .h after 1-h operation. Whilst, the rejection of both iron and zinc ions could be obtained up to 96.9% and 97.8%, respectively. Additionally, almost complete elimination of colour (99.6%) could be achieved using NF270 membrane. Thus, it can be concluded that the commercial NF270 membrane is promising in removing both heavy metal ions and dye from printing wastewater

CuBTC metal organic framework incorporation for enhancing separation and antifouling properties of nanofiltration membrane

Novel thin film nanocomposite (TFN) nanofiltration membrane with tunable physico-chemical properties and separation performances was fabricated by incorporating the copper benzene-1,3,5-tricarboxylate (CuBTC) nanoparticles with different concentrations (ranging from 0 to 0.75 wt.%) in the polysulfone (PSf) substrates, followed by the interfacial polymerization process of trimesoyl chloride (TMC) and piperazine (PIP) to establish top selective layer. Charaterization results show that both chemical and physical properties of poly(piperazineamide) selective layer was altered when PSf substrate was modified by CuBTC. The introduction of CuBTC nanoparticles improved the hydrophilicity of the TFN membranes (from 70.25° to 59.02°) and promoted formation of more linear structure of poly(piperazineamide) entangled with −COOH pendant groups. By incorporating 0.25 wt.% of CuBTC into the PSf substrate, the resultant membrane flux was enhanced by 22% with MgSO4 rejection remained at 97.31%. Furthermore, a notable increment of rejection against NaCl could be attained by increasing the CuBTC content in the substrate. This could be explained by the Donnan potential effect occurred on the more linear structures of poly(piperazineamide) surfaces, which results in an increase in the selectivity of monovalent salts. Moreover, the incorporation of CuBTC rendered the TFN membranes to exhibit good anti-fouling property against bovine serum albumin