Removal of Heavy Metals from Industrial Sludge Using Soil Washing Technique

Article type: Research Article

Authors: Sumalatha, J.^a | Naveen, B.P.^{b; *} | Malik, R.K.^b

Affiliations: [a] Department of Civil Engineering, RIT, Bangalore – 560054, India | [b] Department of Civil Engineering, Amity School of Engineering and Technology, Amity University, Gurgaon, Haryana – 122413, India

Correspondence: [*] Corresponding Author. bpnaveen@ggn.amity.edu

Abstract: In the present study, column leaching tests were conducted with two leaching solutions, i.e., distilled water and 0.1N HCl + 0.1N EDTA to know their removal efficiencies of heavy metal ions of Cu, Zn, Ni, Cd, Pb, Fe and Cr present in the industrial sludge. It was observed that distilled water was able to remove only a few metal ions Cu, Zn, and Ni in lesser quantities. Using 0.1N HCl + 0.1N EDTA, all the heavy metals were leached out with removal efficiencies in the range of 71-98%. Using the results of column leaching tests, the migration rates of different metal ions were determined which can be used to design the soil washing programme at the site to treat the similar sludge.

Keywords: HCl, EDTA, elution curves, dispersion coefficient, retardation factor

DOI: 10.3233/AJW190036

Journal: Asian Journal of Water, Environment and Pollution, vol. 16, no. 3, pp. 83-89, 2019