Phyto-adsorption treatment of paper mill effluent using leaf powder of water hyacinth (Eichhornia crassipes [Mart.] Solms

In this present study, an experiment was performed to find the potential of leaf powder of water hyacinth (Eichhornia crassipes) in treating paper mill effluent. During the study the value of different parameters viz., pH (5.80±0.10), TDS (980.22±12.52 mgL^-1), EC (6.52±0.11 dS m^-1), BOD (86.42±4.61 mgL^-1), COD (281.01±8.66 mgL^-1), PO₄^3- (71.46±6.00 mgL^-1), TKN (84.99±3.92 mgL^-1), Na (136.94±6.66 mgL^-1), K (95.01±3.48 mgL^-1) and total hardness (442.39±3.78 mgL^-1) of paper mill effluent were recorded higher before bio-adsorption treatment using leaf powder of E. crassipes. The leaf powder of E. crassipes significantly (P<0.05/P<0.01) removed TDS, EC, BOD, COD, TKN, Na, K and total hardness of the paper mill effluent. The result of the present study on the  bio-adsorption treatment using leaf powder of E. crassipes of paper mill effluent showed maximum reduction in the effluent characteristics viz., pH (6.62±0.08), TDS (848.42±7.67 mgL^-1), EC (4.08±0.17 dS m^-1), BOD (62.56±3.39 mgL^-1), COD (218.11±8.59 mgL^-1), PO₄^3- (50.13±4.33 mgL^-1), TKN (63.04±6.47 mgL^-1), Na (100.06±6.99 mgL^-1), K (66.00±7.38 mgL^-1) and total hardness (347±9.86 mgL^-1) of paper mill effluent after bio-adsorption treatment using leaf powder of E. crassipes. The maximum removal of TDS (13.45%), EC (37.43%), BOD (25.89%), COD (22.38%), PO43- (29.85%), TKN (25.83%), Na (26.94%), K (30.54%) and Total hardness (21.56%) in the paper mill effluent were recovered after phyto-adsorption treatment using leaf powder of E. crassipes. The decrease of paper mill effluent parameter is likely due to that the leaf powder of water hyacinth absorbs the nutrient from the effluent. Therefore, the leaf powder of can be used as phyto-adsorbent for the removal of various pollution parameters.