Abstract
Diminishing access to clean water due to pollution, increased population and anthropogenic activities is a major risk facing the world today. This intractable problem is aggravated further by climate change. Chlorinated organic compounds (COCs) are among the European Union list of priority substances that pose a high health risk. This is due to the presence of a strong carbon-chlorine bond that makes their environmental degradation very slow. In addition, they are also difficult to metabolize and excrete. Of particular interest to this study are pesticides such as dieldrin, chlorpyrifos, fipronil and diuron, that are manufactured in large quantities for use, in agriculture and the highly toxic metal ions like Pb2+ and Cd2+, released from industrial effluents in addition to the metals that play the role of redox couples in the bimetallic nanoparticles (NPs) used for dechlorination process such as Fe, Pd, Ti, and Ag. Our current conventional water treatment methods (precipitation, coagulation, flocculation and filtration) do not remove trace levels of these pollutants. Therefore, pesticide and heavy metal poisoning may result from the ingestion of contaminated water, food, dermal contact and breathing polluted air. There is need therefore to remove metals and pesticides from water systems (both wastewater and drinking water). In this study, the focus was the employment of nanomaterials, namely, the zero valent iron (ZVI) technology for removal of metals and pesticides.
Ph.D. (Chemistry)