The potential of wheat germs as a coagulant to treat batik wastewater / Nurhaslina C.R, Ku Halim Ku Hamid and Siti Zuraida Mohamad

The purpose of this study is to identify the potential of wheat germs as a coagulant to treat batik wastewater. Dyestuffs present in textile industry wastewater are hardly to degrade by biological means and many synthetic dyes are toxic, mutagenic and carcinogenic. Dye can be removed from wastewater by chemical and physical methods such as adsorption, coagulation and flocculation, oxidation, filtration and electrochemical methods. However, coagulation is one of the most common processes in the water and wastewater treatment. An organic polymer Polyaluminium Chloride (PAC) and inorganic salt Aluminium Sulphate (Alum) are the most widely used coagulant in water treatment. In order to reduces the harmful of chemical coagulants toward environment, the naturally sources coagulants that are easily available and abundantly left without significant usage has been investigated and discovered. For this study, wheat germs will use as the natural coagulant. The newly invented plant based coagulant, wheat germs are the abundantly available agricultural in Malaysia and cheap. Besides that, wheat is categorized in cereal group which is well known as the food that has the ability to absorb cholesterol in blood. Jar Test method was used to conduct the coagulation process for dye wastewater from textiles industries. It is discovered that the wheat germ has successfully removed 66% of COD, 87% of turbidity and 86.5% of color of the dye wastewater through coagulation process. Based on this fact, wheat germs have a big potential to become as anatural coagulant to treat textiles wastewater

Kinetic Behaviour of Pancreatic Lipase Inhibition by Ultrasonicated A. malaccensis and A. subintegra Leaves of Different Particle Sizes

Gallic acid and quercetin equivalent were determined in the crude extract of matured leaves Aquilaria malaccensis and Aquilaria subintegra. The leaves of both Aquilaria species were dried at 60 °C for 24 hours, ground and sieved into particle size of 250, 300, 400, 500, and 1000 µm. Then, each particle size of leaves was soaked in distilled water with a ratio of 1:100 (w/v) for 24 hours and undergoes the pre-treatment method by using ultrasonicator (37 kHz), at the temperature of 60 °C for 30 minutes. The crude extracts were obtained after about 4 hours of hydrodistillation process. The highest concentration of gallic acid and quercetin equivalent was determined in the crude extract from the particle size of 250 µm. The kinetics of pancreatic lipase inhibition was further studied based using the Lineweaver-Burk plot, wherein the concentration of p-NPP as the substrate and pancreatic lipase were varied. Based on the formation of the lines in the plot, the crude leaves extract of both Aquilaria species exhibit the mixed-inhibition on pancreatic lipase, which indicates that in the reaction, the inhibitors were not only attached to the free pancreatic lipase, but also to the pancreatic lipase-(p-NPP) complex. The reaction mechanism was similar to non-competitive inhibition; however the value of dissociation constant, Ki, for both inhibition pathways was different. The inhibition shows an increment in Michaelis-Menten constant (Km) and a reduction in the maximum pancreatic lipase activity (Vm) compared to the reaction without Aquilaria spp. crude extracts (control). This proved that the inhibition occurred in this reaction. Copyright © 2021 by Authors, Published by BCREC Group. This is an open access article under the CC BY-SA License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0). 

Determination of some properties of used cooking oil using AAS, bomb calorimeter and GC-MS techniques

Most of the used cooking oil from households and catering premises in Malaysia will eventually ends up in wastewaters. It will be discharged to the surface of waters because no alternative steps were taken to overcome the waste from used cooking oil. As a component of wastewater, oil is classified together with fats and waxes as grease. This trend results in the generation of a vast waste stream that needs to be properly managed to avoid environmental damage. Thus, the information regarding on the waste cooking oil properties is needed to contribute knowledge for future research where the waste may reformed to value added product. Preliminary analysis of used cooking oil properties via GCMS using capillary column shows n-Hexadecanoic acid and Oleic acid as the major compounds present in the used frying oil. The analysis for determination of volatile and moisture content with 3 replicates show an average of 0.02% moisture and volatile content, which the experimental procedure was based on MPOB Test Methods

Characteristics and mechanical properties changes due to incorporation of aloe vera in polyethylene-based film / Siti Fatma Abd Karim …[et al.]

Non-degradable properties of polyethylene (PE) films due to long-chain structure cause increment of solid waste plastic. Many researchers, with different purposes, have studied the incorporation of functional materials to PE. Exploring the impact of the incorporation of aloe Vera (AV) into PE films in terms of its characteristic and mechanical properties is the main objective of this paper. The films were prepared using melt-blending and hot press technique. The characterisation assessed for the PE and PE-AV films were spectroscopy, crystalline phase, thermal analysis, and performance of the mechanical properties of the sample. Some of the AV functional groups disappeared upon addition with PE but has the possibility of two sharing peaks between AV and PE, which was 1472 and 2915 cm-1. Lower thermal degradation temperature (Td) obtained for PE-AV3 while other films found no significant changes in Td value, and only one peak of thermal degradation occurred for all films. The same goes for the analysis obtained from differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) data. However, the crystalline structure displayed momentous peak changes for PE with AV. The highest tensile strength (TS) obtained by PE-AV3, at once, developing the highest value of Young’s modulus (YM), modulus of resilience (UE), and modulus of toughness (UT). A certain amount of AV has a substantial effect on changing the polymeric structure, especially improving the mechanical properties of PE film. Therefore, AV has the potential to become an additive for developing a new, partially degradable PE film

Optimization of food waste utilization in the RDF recovery energy facility

It is well known that there is a significant increased in the quantity of Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) generated every year. Therefore, the management of MSW must be handled carefully by experts. Malaysia as one of the developing country with population nearly 30 millions also facing problems related to MSW management and this issue is quite critical. Even though various programmes were established and few model technologies were introduced by the government to manage MSW effectively, but the impact remain unsatisfaction. For example, the energy facility recovery project which use MSW gathered around Kajang as an alternative fuel still not successful to provide energy according to the design capacity of that particular facility. This failure was observed due to the impact composition of MSW collected which consists huge amount of food waste (57%), 16% plastic, 15% diaper, 9% mixed papers and the remaining 3% textile. The existing process technology at Refused Derived Fuel (RDF) facility is no designed to create a new economic benefit from abundant incoming food waste to the facility. Therefore in this paper, the analysis and suggestion of technology on existing RDF recovery energy facility will be discussed especially on how to overcome the abundant composition of food waste

Encapsulation of multi-enzymes on waste clay material: preparation, characterization and application for tapioca starch hydrolysis

Alpha-amylase, glucoamylase and cellulase were immobilized onto calcium alginate-waste clay (alg-WC) beads by using encapsulation technique. The clay was obtained from palm oil mill clay bath processing waste that was collected from FELDA Serting Hilir Palm Oil Mill, Malaysia. The aim of this study is to characterize and investigate the performance of waste clay as a supporting material for the tapioca starch hydrolysis. The encapsulated enzymes were characterized by using analytical equipment such as Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR) and Field Emission Scanning Electron Microscopy (FESEM). The FTIR results showed the interaction of functional groups between alginate and waste clay in the alg-WC beads. The alginate beads characterized at peaks 1615 cm-1, 1417 cm-1 and 1027 cm-1, and peaks 1396 cm-1, 873 cm-1 and 712 cm-1 characterized the waste clay. The FESEM analysis also revealed that the different surface morphology of alginate beads and alg-WC beads. It also showed that the enzymes were successfully encapsulated within the alg-WC beads. The activity of the immobilized enzymes was studied at different clay concentrations. The highest immobilization yield was obtained at 2% (w/v) of clay concentration and the highest enzyme loading was 98.29 %. The immobilized enzymes also retained 33% of its activity after seven usage cycle with 1 hour of each reaction time

Plant-Based Tacca leontopetaloides Biopolymer Flocculant (TBPF) Produced High Removal of Turbidity, TSS, and Color for Leachate Treatment

Wastewater treatment is crucial to ensure a sustainable supply of clean water, especially for human use. Natural flocculants can overcome the disadvantages of chemical flocculants in wastewater treatment. This study proposes a new natural-based flocculant from the Tacca leontopetaloides plant for leachate treatment. The plant tuber was processed through gelatinization to produce Tacca leontopetaloides biopolymer flocculant (TBPF). The characterization of TBPF for flocculant properties was investigated, and the performance of TBPF on leachate treatment using a standard jar test procedure was examined at different pH values of leachate and TBPF dosages. The characteristics of TBPF in terms of amylose/amylopectin fraction, viscosity, and zeta potential were 26:74, 0.037–0.04 Pa·s, and −13.14 mV, respectively. The presence of –COOH and –OH structure in TBPF indicates the flocculant properties. TBPF reduced the turbidity, total suspended solids (TSS), and color from 218 NTU, 214 mg/L, 14201 PtCo to 45.8–54.5 NTU, 19.3–19.9 mg/L, and 852–994 PtCo, respectively, using 240 mg/L of TBPF at pH 3. These results show a high potential of the new plant-based TBPF for leachate treatment and water industry applications

Plant-based tacca leontopetaloides biopolymer flocculant (TBPF) produced high removal of heavy metal ions at low dosage

High removal of heavy metals using plant-based bioflocculant under low concentration is required due to its low cost, abundant source, and nontoxicity for improved wastewater management and utilization in the water industry. This paper presents a treatment of synthetic wastewater using plant-based Tacca leontopetaloides biopolymer flocculant (TBPF) without modification on its structural polymer chains. It produced a high removal of heavy metals (Zn, Pb, Ni, and Cd) at a low concentration of TBPF dosage. In our previous report, TBPF was characterized and successfully reduced the turbidity, total suspended solids, and color for leachate treatment; however, its effectiveness for heavy metal removal has not been reported. The removal of these heavy metals was performed using a standard jar test procedure at different pH values of synthetic wastewater and TBPF dosages. The effects of hydroxide ion, pH, initial TBPF concentration, initial metal ion concentration, and TBPF dosage were examined using one factorial at the time (OFAT). The results show that the highest removal for Zn, Pb, Ni, and Cd metal ions were 98.4–98.5%, 79–80%, 97–98%, and 92–93%, respectively, using 120 mg/L dosage from the initial concentration of 10% TBPF at pH 10. The final concentrations for Zn, Pb, Ni, and Cd metal ions were 0.043–0.044, 0.41–0.43, 0.037–0.054, and 0.11–0.13 mg/L, respectively, which are below the Standard B discharge limit set by the Department of Environment (DOE), Malaysia. The results show that TBPF has a high potential for the removal of heavy metals, particularly Zn, Pb, Ni, and Cd, in real wastewater treatment

Utilization of Agarwood Distillation Waste in Oilwell Cement and Its Effect on Free Water and Porosity

The intent of this research is to utilize the waste produced by distillation process of Agarwood oil and convert it into a profitable oilwell cement additive. Common problem during oilwell cementing is free wáter separation. This problem could weaken cement at the top, gas migration problem and non uniform density of cement slurry that are even worst in cementing deviated well. Another concern on cementing design is the porosity of the hardened cement. If the cement is too porous, it can lead to gas migration and casing corrosion. All tests were conducted according to API Specification-10B. Free water test was determined at different concentrations of Agarwood Waste Additive (AWA), different inclination angles and different temperatures. Based on the findings, it was observed that zero free water was produced when 2% BWOC of AWA was used at all angles. The findings also revealed that AWA can maintain good thermal stability as it could maintain zero free water at increased temperature up to 60˚C. The porosity of AWA cement was comparable with standard API neat cement as the porosity did not differ much at 2% BWOC of AWA. Therefore, it can be concluded that the AWA is suitable to be used as an additive in oil well cement (OWC) with 2% BWOC is taken as the optimum concentration

Development and test of a new catalytic converter for natural gas fuelled engine

This paper presents characteristics of a new catalytic converter (catco) to be used for natural gas fuelled engine. The catco were developed based on catalyst materials consisting of metal oxides such as titanium dioxide (TiO2) and cobalt oxide (CoO) with wire mesh substrate. Both of the catalyst materials (such as TiO2 and CoO) are inexpensive in comparison with conventional catalysts (noble metals) such as palladium or platinum. In addition, the noble metals such as platinum group metals are now identified as human health risk due to their rapid emissions in the environment from various resources like conventional catalytic converter, jewelers and other medical usages. It can be mentioned that the TiO2/CoO based catalytic converter and a new natural gas engine such as compressed natural gas (CNG) direct injection (DI) engine were developed under a research collaboration program. The original engine manufacture catalytic conveter (OEM catco) was tested for comparison purposes. The OEM catco was based on noble metal catalyst with honeycomb ceramic substrate. It is experimentally found that the conversion efficiencies of TiO2/CoO based catalytic converter are 93%, 89% and 82% for NOx, CO and HC emissions respectively. It is calculated that the TiO2/CoO based catalytic converter reduces 24%, 41% and 40% higher NOx, CO and HC emissions in comparison to OEM catco respectively. The objective of this paper is to develop a low-cost three way catalytic converter to be used with the newly developed CNG-DI engine. Detailed review on catalytic converter, low-cost catalytic converter development characteristics and CNGDI engine test results have been presented with discussions