Remediation of Abandoned Mine Lands

Friday, October 3, 2008 : 11:20 a.m.

Treatment of Brines Using Zeolite Synthesized from Fly Ash Derivative

Thantaswa Sonquishe1, Gillian Balfour1, Viswanath Ravi Kumar Vadapalli1, Natasha Misheer2, Leslie Petrik1 and Wilson Gitari1, (1)University of the Western Cape, (2)Eskom Holdings Limited

Water is becoming an increasingly precious commodity in South Africa that will require effective management to supply all of South African future needs. There is an urgent need of treatment technologies by which the brine can be treated and pure water can be recovered as the discharge of the brine into water resources, both directly and indirectly, has been prohibited by law. Currently, the treatment of hypersaline streams resulting from industrial processing such as power generation, coal mining activities or water treatment is highly costly and problematic. It is therefore necessary to develop cost effective ways to manage brines for long term sustainability.

This paper investigates the treatment of brines using zeolites synthesized from fly ash derivatives. Zeolite P was synthesized hydrothermally from fly ash or fly ash derivatives. The removal of elements from the brine using the fly ash derivatives are compared to fly ash and commercial zeolite Y. It was found that the zeolite P synthesized from fly ash derivates had a greater removal of the major elements (ie. Ca, Mg) than the commercial zeolite Y. In terms of the removal of the minor elements (ie. Al, V, Be, Cr, As, Fe, Mn, Zn, Co and Se), zeolite P was found to correspond to that of fly ash and commercial zeolite Y.

Viswanath Ravi Kumar Vadapalli, University of the Western Cape I have finished my M.Sc& Ph.D. in Applied Geochemistry from Osmania University, India. My Ph.D. topic was "Soil Geochemistry of Patancheru Industrial Belt, Medak District, A.P., India". In 2003 I moved to Republic of South Africa to Pursue my Postdoctoral Research and currently I am a Postdoc in the Environmental and Nano Sciences Group, University of the Western Cape, South Africa. My research interests are innovative waste water treatment technologies, fate of inorganic pollutants in waste waters, waste managament etc.

Natasha Misheer, Eskom Holdings Limited Natasha finished her Master's in chemistry from the University of the Kwazulu Natal, Durban South African.She worked for a company called Mintek for some time and later moved to Eskom Holdings Limited in Johannesburg.


Remediation of Abandoned Mine Lands