Physicochemical and Performance Evaluation of Natural and Modified Ire-Ekiti clay: Emerging Substrate in the De-fluoridation of Drinking Water

Potable water is one of the implicit requisites for healthy living. Groundwater is an affordable source of drinking water in most rural areas of Nigeria. One of the major challenges in drinking water quality is fluoride, which dosage above 1.5mg/L has been reported to cause some related health issues. Adsorption methods have proven to be effective in the de-fluoridation of drinking water. However, this works examines the physiochemical and performance evaluation of Ire-Ekiti clay in the de-fluoridation of drinking water. A method-The clay soil was characterized by the determination of Cation Exchange Capacity at pH values of 5.4 and 7.4, organic matter content and xray fluorescence analysis. Batch experiments were conducted to evaluate and optimize various operational parameters such as contact time, adsorbent dose, pH and speed of agitation. It was observed that Fe3+ modified Ire-Ekiti clay soil had the highest adsorption parameters as 2.5 g/100 mL of Ire-Ekiti clay soil removed up to 65.3% of fluoride from the initial concentration of 2 mg/L at a pH of 6 with a contact time of 25 min and agitation speed of 350 rpm. Therefore Fe3+modified Ire-Ekiti clay soil has potential for application in de-fluoridation of groundwater.