Case Study: Removing Iron & Manganese in South Africa
Client: Emalahleni Water Purification Plant – Witbank City Government Office
The Witbank Municipal WTP in Durban South Africa consists of 18 large rapid sand filters utilising 1200 tonnes of filter media to remove iron and manganese from the local ground water reservoir.
Local company: Water Technologies Cape PL demonstrated the performance and cost benefits of upgrading the system to DMI65, by successful pilot trial in 2018. Upgrades to the plant commenced in 2019 and expected to be completed by the end of 2020.
Watch the video above of DMI-65 successfully removing iron & manganese.
Report on DMI 65 trials at George Municipality for Sister Project:
Iron Removal
It appears that iron removal is very effective regardless of the pH. The highest residual iron found was 0.01 mg/l. (SANS 241 requires less than 0.20)
Manganese Removal
Manganese removal is also very efficient. The highest remaining manganese found was 0.06 mg/l (SANS 241 requires less than 0.10) which occurred after problems with the flocculation process and at a high pH. Further investigation is needed to determine optimum pH for manganese removal.
Aluminium Removal
Aluminium tests were only done once on 13 December and we found 0.03 mg/l. (SANS 241 requires less than 0.30). It seems that we are getting an additional benefit of aluminium removal even at the higher pH.
Turbidity
After the first 48 hours of operation the highest turbidity recorded was 0.06 NTU. (SANS 241 require less than 1.0) It has been noted that during the flocculation problems, the quality of the water after filtration through the DMI 65 remained very good while the filters with normal sand were back-washed repeatedly.
To view the full case study.
