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Surface Water Treatment Using Tamarind Seed as Coagulants via

Coagulation Process
To cite this article: NA Zainol and Nur Nasuha Mohd Fadli 2020 IOP Conf. Ser.: Mater. Sci. Eng. 864 012172

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2nd Joint Conference on Green Engineering Technology & Applied Computing 2020 IOP Publishing
IOP Conf. Series: Materials Science and Engineering 864 (2020) 012172 doi:10.1088/1757-899X/864/1/012172

Surface Water Treatment Using Tamarind Seed as Coagulants

via Coagulation Process

NA Zainol 1 and Nur Nasuha Mohd Fadli1

1
Department of Chemical Engineering Technology, Faculty of Engineering
Technology, Universiti Malaysia Perlis, 02100 Padang Besar, Malaysia

E-mail: aineezainol@unimap.edu.my

Abstract. The potential of natural coagulants is highly sought nowadays as the use of
commercial coagulants, aluminum sulfate (alum) affect the environment negatively. An
alternative coagulant is needed. In this study, the effectiveness of natural coagulant, the tamarind
seed extract is being evaluated as a coagulant to measure the highest percentage removal of
turbidity and chemical oxygen demand (COD) in the surface water. The surface water sample
taken from the Sungai Perlis located in Kangar, Perlis. The sample were analysed using Jar Test
Experimental works with rapid mixing speed of 120 rpm in 1 minutes, slow mixing speed of 30
rpm in 20 minutes and settling time of 1 hour. The tamarind seed is being extracted using distilled
water and 1 M of sodium chloride (NaCI). Seed extract from distilled water effectively removes
99.2% of turbidity and 77.2% of COD with optimum coagulant dosage of 30 mg/L and optimal
pH 5.0. While, the seed extracts from 1 M of NaCI can remove 99.4% of turbidity and 73.8% of
COD with the optimum coagulant dosage of 30 mg/L and optimal pH 3.0. Hence, this study
demonstrates the potentials of the seed extract of tamarind seeds using distilled water in treating
the surface water.

1. Introduction
In the past few past decades, the quality of the water is declining sharply because of the anthropogenic
activities mainly in the industrial field. In Malaysia, there are two major causes of the polluted surface
water which are the land development for industry and natural resources activity. The polluted surface
water from the industrial came from the new development of the textile, foods, beverages and healthcare
industries that has been increasing in this past few year. The agriculture area came from the development
of the new agricultural activities and logging area. The waste produced from those area is not being
treated and being released in the river causing the deterioration of the quality of the surface water [1].
Those activities mentioned above causing the soil erosion to seep in the surface water like rivers and
lakes contributing to the rise of the organic, inorganic matter and river sedimentation problem. It
contributes to the increasing of the turbidity of the water itself. Furthermore, the eutrophication
phenomenon that was also a result from the human activities has also severely affected the quality of
the water [2] and risking the human health. The river sedimentations promote the repository of the heavy
metals and the buildup of those elements may reach a certain threshold of toxicity to aquatic life and
eventually to the food chain systems [3].
There are several techniques that can be used to treat the polluted surface water especially river. One
of them is the coagulation technology that requires coagulants. The conventional coagulant such as
acrylamide has strong neurotoxic and carcinogenic effects [4].Besides, the other conventional
coagulants like iron salts, they need a meticulous process controls are needed as the excessive iron

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2nd Joint Conference on Green Engineering Technology & Applied Computing 2020 IOP Publishing
IOP Conf. Series: Materials Science and Engineering 864 (2020) 012172 doi:10.1088/1757-899X/864/1/012172

residualin the treated water will lead to the highly visible rust or bloodcolored stains [5] caused by the
hydrolysis of ironsalts.The solution to these problems is by using the natural coagulants instead of the
conventional coagulants. Nowadays, the natural or the plant-based coagulant has been widely used and
practiced all around the world. In this study, tamarind seeds are being used as the natural coagulants to
replace the conventional coagulants (chemical). It is safe, eco-friendly and generally free from toxic
[6],[7]. In addition, it can also produce smaller sludge volume of up to five times lower and a higher
nutritionalsludge value [8]. Hence, the tamarind seeds are selected as the natural coagulants replacing
the conventional coagulants, alum to treat the polluted surface water.
In this study, two different extraction solutions were used which are distilled water and sodium
chloride (NaCI) to extract the active component of the tamarind seeds. The used of seed extract is more
appealing as it will produce smaller sludge compared to the used of the seeds itself. However, the
previous researcher combines the use of extract tamarind seeds with the coagulant aid such as
polyacrylamide (PAM) [9]. Furthermore, there is also a study that used NaCI as extraction solution, but
the effectiveness is being questioned as synthetic turbid water is used instead of the river water. As
mentioned above, the potential of seeds extract of tamarind seeds is not being explored thoroughly.
Hence, this study will focus more on the ability of the seed extracts of tamarind seeds without coagulant
aid to remove turbidity and COD on surface water (river water) using distilled water and NaCI.

2. Material and Method

2.1. Preparation of coagulants

In this experiment, tamarind seeds were used as the natural coagulants. The tamarind seeds were
collected from the kitchen waste in municipal area. The whole seeds were grounded to fine powder using
a laboratory mill. All the grounded materials were sieved through 750 μm sieve and the fraction with
particle sizes less than 750 μm was used in experiments. Fifty grams of prepared powder was suspended
in 1 L of distilled water and 1.0 M NaCl and the suspension was stirred using a magnetic stirrer for 10
minutes to extract the coagulation active components. The components were filtered through a filter
paper. The filtered solutions called the crude extracts were prepared prior to the jar test experiment is
run.

2.2. Sampling of river water

The water samples were collected under turbulent condition because of the rainy day. The samples were
collected manually from the bridge of Sg. Perlis. Grab sampling technique was used to collect the water
sample. After that, the samples were filled inside an empty plastic bottle of 1.5 L. The bottles were
labeled using a sticker. The river is located at Kangar, Perlis. Sg. Perlis is recorded as a slightly polluted
river with a WQI of class III by the DOE [10].

2.3. Jar test

The coagulation activity of each seed extract was determined by the jar test. The apparatus consists of
six batch reactors, each jar equipped with a paddle mixer. The sample of surface water were filled up in
each beaker and mixed at constant room temperature. Different doses of seed extracts were added into
the beakers and run the jar test for 1 minute at 120 rpm. The mixing speed was reduced to 30 rpm and
kept for 20 minutes. Then the suspensions were left for sedimentation. After 1 hour of sedimentation,
clarified samples were collected from the top of the beaker and the samples were analyzed.

3. Results and Discussions

The observed spectra for dried tamarind seed are illustrated in Figure 1 showed a range of frequency
between 400 cm-1 and 4000 cm-1. The broad absorption band at 3349.17 cm-1 indicates the presence
of -OH functional group [11]. These can prove the theoretical chemical structure of tamarind seeds
consists of polysaccharide polymers of glucose, xylose and galactose. These structures are known to be
responsible for the presence of -OH functional group in tamarind seeds[12]. The spectrum of carboxylic

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2nd Joint Conference on Green Engineering Technology & Applied Computing 2020 IOP Publishing
IOP Conf. Series: Materials Science and Engineering 864 (2020) 012172 doi:10.1088/1757-899X/864/1/012172

acid is represented by two absorption band. The first band is at the peak of 1438.45 cm-1 with a C-O
stretching vibration and the second band is 1645.38 cm-1 with C=O stretching vibration [13]. A sharp
band occurs at the peak of 2926.01cm-1 is because of the C-H stretching vibrations. The peak at 1051.05
cm-1 is represented by the C-O-C stretching vibrations. These functional groups contain properties that
can induce the process of coagulation for tamarind seeds.

Figure 1. FT-IR spectra analysis of tamarind seeds

Zetasizer is used to measure the zeta potential of a molecules especially the surface charge of the
polymer molecules. It can be used to confirm and determine the mechanism used for the coagulant in
the coagulation process. In this study, the surface charge for tamarind seeds is discovered to be in
negative charge, -26.9 mV. Hence, proved the theory where the tamarind seeds are an anionic
polysaccharide [14]. The coagulation mechanism for anionic polyelectrolyte could be credited from the
interlinking between particles lead to the bridging mechanism. The bridging between molecules
happened when the anionic polymers attached to the adsorption sites of the surface water molecules.
The formed bridge will be intertwined together with another bridge that formed on the adjacent sides.
The size will continue to increase until the sites for the intermolecular of the polymers is fully occupied
[15]. Hence, it can help to reduce the contaminants in the contaminated water such as turbidity and
COD. Figure 2 shows the zeta potential analysis of the tamarind seeds.

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2nd Joint Conference on Green Engineering Technology & Applied Computing 2020 IOP Publishing
IOP Conf. Series: Materials Science and Engineering 864 (2020) 012172 doi:10.1088/1757-899X/864/1/012172

Figure 2. Zeta potential analysis of tamarind seeds

The OFAT analysis was applied to study the effect of pH on coagulation process using two extraction
solution, distilled water and 1M of NaCI. In this study, the optimum coagulant dosage, 30mg/L was
used throughout the experiment. Based on Figure 3, it shows the highest percentage removal using
distilled water for turbidity is 99.7% at pH 2.0. Higher pH value (alkaline condition) will decrease the
ability of the coagulant dosage to remove turbidity. This is because, the nature of the coagulant itself is
negative surface charge so, efficient turbidity removal can only occur when the opposite surface charge
are present to allow the binding between molecules. Since, lower pH solution (acidic condition) can
provide positive surface charge, the better removal occur in lower pH solution [16]. Besides, there was
also a possibility that the turbidity being removed due to the settlement of the heavy particles not because
of the charge of the tamarind seeds. This is because the sampling of the water was taken during a rainy
day. The same theory applied to the removal of COD since the highest removal occur at 77.22% at pH
5.0.

Figure 3. Percentage of turbidity and COD removal against pH (distilled water)

The results for the turbidity removal and COD removal using NaCI as extraction solvents on the
tamarind seeds are shown in the Figure 4. The highest removal efficiency for turbidity is 99.4%. at pH
3.0. In contrast, the highest removals of COD occur at alkaline condition of pH8 with 84.5%. The results

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2nd Joint Conference on Green Engineering Technology & Applied Computing 2020 IOP Publishing
IOP Conf. Series: Materials Science and Engineering 864 (2020) 012172 doi:10.1088/1757-899X/864/1/012172

may be affected by the imbalance of the charge introduce to the sample since the NaCI solvents can
leads to salting out effect. The salting out effect may occur at pH 8 that increase the amount of positive
net charge on the solution [17].

Figure 4. Percentage of turbidity and COD removal against pH (NaCI).

The effect of dosage on the seed extract of distilled water is shown in Figure 5. The percentage
removal for turbidity showed fluctuate trend before reaching the highest percentage removal of 84.9%
at dosage of 30 mg/L. After that, the graph continues to show a declining pattern. This could be explained
based on the amount of dosage applied on. Before reaching the highest percentage removal, the dosage
used is not enough to remove all the contaminants and lead to incomplete coagulation process. The
coagulant dosage needs to be added until it reached the optimum dosage. However, further increased of
the coagulant dosage can cause the overcrowding of coagulants. This phenomenon can limit the amount
of adsorption sites available for particle bridging.
On the other hand, the percentage removal of COD from seed extract of distilled water showed a
reversal result. The amount of dosage required to remove COD is higher compared to turbidity. From
the graph, the higher coagulant dosage can remove COD more than 50% while, the lower coagulant
dosage can remove COD in the average of 30% only. Based on the Figure 5, the highest percentage
removal of COD is 62.3% at 0 mg/L coagulant dosage while, the lowest percentage removal of COD is
29.8% at 30 mg/L coagulant dosage. The COD in the jar test of 0 mg/L may experience error reading
due to the longer time of keeping in the chiller.

Figure 5. Percentage of turbidity and COD removal against T.indica extraction dosage (distilled water)

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2nd Joint Conference on Green Engineering Technology & Applied Computing 2020 IOP Publishing
IOP Conf. Series: Materials Science and Engineering 864 (2020) 012172 doi:10.1088/1757-899X/864/1/012172

Figure 6 show the effect of dosage in seed extract of tamarind seeds using 1M of NaCI on the
percentage removal of turbidity and COD. The percentage removals of turbidity show a consistent
increasing trend and achieved highest percentage removal of 85.4% at extraction dosage of 30 mg/L.
Further increasing of the dosage resulted in the decreasing trends of the turbidity removal. As discussed
earlier, the overdosing phenomenon is responsible for the decreasing trends. For COD removal, the
highest percentage removals occur at dosage of 20 mg/L with 71.7%. It gives a contrast result when
compared to the used of distilled water. It could be due to the salting out effect takes places when higher
dosage is used to remove COD.

Figure 6. Percentage of turbidity and COD removal against T. indica extraction dosage (NaCI)

4. Conclusions
In this study, the treatment of surface water using tamarind seeds as coagulant was successfully
conducted. Two extraction solutions used to extract the active component in the tamarind seeds that can
induce the performance of the coagulant itself. When distilled water is used as the extraction solution,
99.2% and 77.2% are achieved for the percentage removal of turbidity and COD respectively. The
optimum condition achieved is at coagulant dosage at 30 mg/L and pH 5.0. In comparison, the used of
NaCI at optimum dosage of 30 mg/L and optimum pH of 3.0 gives 99.4% and 73.8% for the highest
percentage removal achieved for both turbidity and COD. The removal efficiency for extraction
solutions, distilled water and 1M of NaCI solution was almost similar. This scenario proved that
tamarind seeds can be used to replace the commercial coagulant, alum in the water treatment industry
in the future. Hence, tamarind seeds using distilled water as solvent can be proposed as the effective
natural coagulant that are safe to be used as it is safe to used without causing serious health effect to the
environment. Throughout the study, the polyelectrolyte ion and polysaccharide present inside the
tamarind seeds had been recognized and confirmed as one of the many factors that contributed to the
efficiency of the natural tamarind seeds as the coagulant. The performances are almost as efficient as
the commercial coagulants.

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IOP Conf. Series: Materials Science and Engineering 864 (2020) 012172 doi:10.1088/1757-899X/864/1/012172

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