WATER PAGES
Wessex Water is first to trial innovative technology
WessexWater has become the first UK water company to trial ‘Shade Balls’ at its Didmarton water recycling centre in Gloucestershire.
The water and sewerage company has experienced algal blooms in its final effluent tertiary lagoon for years, which has led to a long history of suspended solids sample failures.
After trying various strategies to prevent algal blooms, Wessex Water recently covered the lagoon in Shade Balls – an innovative technology that blocks UV rays and has been
shown to reduce algae growth in bodies of water.
Sophie Ward, assistant treatment manager at Wessex Water, said: “In recent years, various technologies and strategies have been used to maintain compliance at Didmarton WRC.
“This trial has the potential to be a viable long- term solution to the site’s algae issue and we look forward to seeing what data the trial produces.”
Shade Balls are used by other water companies
internationally, but Wessex Water is the first UK water company to adopt the technology.
Sophie added: “If the trial proves successful, then Shade Balls have the potential to be rolled out across the business at both our supply and waste sites.
“The technology is recyclable and has a 10-year guarantee, with other sites seeing no deterioration in the quality of the product to date with the supplier being confident that they do not perish.”
Graphene acid helps remove
heavy metal pollutants from water Expanding the potential of graphene derivatives for societal challenges
Researchers at Graphene Flagship associated member, Palacký University Olomouc in the Czech Republic, have shown graphene decorated with carboxylic groups extract has the potential to remove different types of metallic pollutant from water. Funded by a European Research Council (ERC) consolidator grant, the Partnering Project 2D-CHEM has the potential to solve one of the world’s largest water challenges.
The World Health Organization estimates half of the world’s population will be living in water-stressed areas by 2025, and contamination with heavy metals is among the primary threats to aquatic ecosystems and human health. Yet, the most economically advantageous method for metal removal from water is sorption, the chemical process of attaching one substance to another.
However, current sorption technologies are often inefficient in capturing heavy metals in
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water. As part of the Graphene Flagship’s efforts, the project hassucceeded in producing a sorbent with graphene acid, an ultra-thin organic acid that offers excellent biocompatibility, conductivity and dispersibility in water.
The discovery comes after years of working on strategies to chemically synthetise graphene derivatives, which cannot be obtained by direct functionalisation of graphene itself. The researchers prepared graphene acid starting from fluorographene, using a technique developed at the Graphene Flagship associated member, Palacký University Olomouc, by replacing fluorine with other chemical elements to obtain the desired graphene derivative.
For example, graphene acid was prepared via a two-step process. Firstly, fluorographene was transformed into fluorine-free cyanographene and, secondly, it was hydrolysed to graphene
| July 2021 |
www.draintraderltd.com acid.
“In principle, we can introduce any group to the surface of graphene, such as carboxyl,
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