Efficiency of Moringa Oleifera Seeds as Natural Alternative to The Chemical Coagulants in Drinking Water Treatment Process

Coagulants play an important role in natural water purification and sludge disposal. However, Coagulants are commonly used in traditional treatment processes as aluminiumsulfate (Alum). There has been a lot of interest in creating and using plant-based natural coagulants such as Moringa oleifera(MO) because of their natural characteristics and the absence of metals in their structure. The main aim of the present study is to compare the efficiency of MO seeds as a natural coagulant and Alum (the traditional chemical coagulant) for decontamination of drinking water. Therefore, raw water samples were collected from Mahmoudia Canal (MC) intake during the course of the study, where quality parameters of raw water including temperature, pH, EC, DO, turbidity, TDS, BOD, COD, sulfates, aluminium, heterotrophic bacteria (HB), total coliform bacteria (TC) and total phytoplankton count were determined before and after the treatment process and also, the removal efficiencies were calculated. Treatment with MO seed powder didn't affect water temperature, Electrical conductivity slightly increased during the interaction of MO seeds with water but didn't affect water quality. Concerning turbidity, MO showed almost the same removal (83.6%) as alum (88.8%) with RC of 3.6 and 2.5 NTU, which is much lower than the MPLS. MO exhibited higher activity towards the removal of BOD (51.1%), COD (77.39%), sulfate (5.75%) and HB (90.0%) removal compared to 39.4, -4.36, 75.14 and 83.3% achieved by alum respectively. In addition, Moringaincreased DO to (7.06 mg/l), TDS (2.9%) and aluminium(49.57%) in the water compared to 6.4 mg/l, 0.29% and 88.25% additions obtained by alum. This confirmed the positive role of MO in decreasing organisms that consume dissolved oxygen (DO), breaking down complexes productionof soluble salts (TDS) and reduction in aluminum levels. It is then concluded that using Moringa seed powder is more effective, economicaland safe for removing turbidity and other contaminants from raw drinking water compared to alum.