Bicol University Guinobatan

CHEM 1 Chemistry for Engineers

chemistry
of water
Hannah Angelie H. Olivarez, RCh
LEARNING OBJECTIVES

After this lesson, students should be able to:

1. Explain the importance of water.
2. Describe sources and characteristics of water.
3. Describe the effects of human activities and climate change on
water resources.
4. Explain the consequences of excessive water withdrawal.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
01 02 03
INTRODUCTION SOURCES characteristics
Where Does Water Characteristics imparted
Importance of Water
Comes From? by impurities in water

04 05
EFFECT OF HUMANS EXCESSIVE WATER
How can human actions WITHDRAWAL
seriously affect water What are the consequences
resources? of excessive water
withdrawal?
WATER!
H2O, is a small yet complex molecule
that can be linked to almost every
organism and chemical process.
 01
INTRODUCTION
Importance of Water
 Importance of
water
Water is nature's most wonderful, abundant
and useful compound. Of the many essential
elements for the existence of human beings,
animals and plants (air, water, food, shelter,
etc.), water is rated to be of the greatest
importance. Without food, human cell survives
for a number of days, but water is such an
essential thing that without it one cannot
survive.
How much water is there?

Water
71% Earth's surface is
water-covered
 global water distribution
01 02
Oceans, Seas 96.54% 1.74% Ice caps, Glaciers, &
and Bays Permanent Snow

04 03
Soil Moisture, Ground 0.03% 1.69%
Ice & Permafrost, Groundwater
Lakes, Atmosphere,
Swamp Water, Rivers,
and Biological waters
THREE GORGES DAM
 Sources of
02 water
Where does water comes from?
sources of water

Surface water ground waters

Any body of water above ground,
Water found underground in the cracks
including streams, rivers, lakes,
and spaces in soil, sand and rock.
wetlands, reservoirs, and creeks.
Are Ice caps, Glaciers, & Permanent
Snow considered as water sources?
SURFACE WATER
RAIN WATER 1 2 River water
Purest form of natural Fed by rain and spring
water waters

Lake water 4 3 Sea water

Fed and drained by rivers the most impure form of
and streams. the water
Rain water
● Source: Evaporation
● It dissolves a considerable
amount of industrial gases
(like CO2, SO2, NO2, etc.) and
suspended solid particles,
both of organic and
inorganic origin.
 Rivers
● fed by rain and spring
waters.
● flow over the surface of land
● dissolves the soluble
minerals of the soil and finally
falls in rivers

Bicol River Basin

 Rivers
● Dissolved minerals of the soil such
as
○ chlorides,
○ sulphates,
○ bicarbonates of sodium, calcium,
magnesium and iron.
● River water also contains the
organic matter
○ decomposition of plants, and
○ small particles of sand and
○ rock suspension.
Quitinday
 LAKE WATER
● has a more constant chemical
composition.
● contains much lesser amount of
dissolved minerals than well
water, but quantity of organic
matter present in it is quite high.

Bulusan Lake in Sorsogon

 SEA WATER
● the most impure form of the water.
● Rivers join the sea and throw in
the impurities carried by them.

Albay Gulf
 SEA WATER
● Continuous evaporation of water
from the surface of sea makes sea
water continuously richer in
dissolved impurities.
● Sea water contains, on an average,
about
○ 3.5% of dissolved salts, out of which
about 2.6% is sodium chloride.
○ sulphates of sodium;
○ bicarbonates of potassium
magnesium and calcium;
○ bromides of potassium and
Bacacay, Albay magnesium and
○ a number of other compounds.
 Surface water
Surface water, generally, contains suspended matter, which
often contains the disease–producing (or pathogenic)
bacteria’s. Hence, such waters as such are not considered to
be safe for human consumption.
 Ground water!
Global groundwater volume stored beneath the
Earth’s surface represents 96 percent of the Earth’s
unfrozen freshwater (Shiklomanov and Rodda, 2003).
Groundwater provides useful functions and services
to humans and the environment.
● It feeds springs and streams, supports
wetlands,
● maintains land surface stability in areas of
unstable ground, and
● acts as an overall critical water resource
serving our water needs.
is groundwater a renewable
resource?
 03
characteristics
Characteristic and consequent effects of
impurities on the quality of water
Impurities in water

Physical impurities Chemical impurities

Color Acidity
Turbidity Mineral matters
Taste Biological impurities
Odor
characteristics of water
odor
turbidity Due to the presence
Due to insoluble of living or decaying
substances organisms

1 2 3 4

color taste
Due to dissolved Due to the presence
substances and of dissolved mineral
substances
 COLOR
● caused by metallic substances like
salts of iron, manganese, humus
materials, tannins, peat, algae,
weeds, protozoa, industrial effluents
(from paper and pulp, textile,
tanneries, etc).

Lake Hillier in Australia

 COLOR
● change in color of water is not harmful,
unless it is associated with any
chemical of toxic nature.
● Variations in color of water from the
same source (say a river) with time
often serves as indices of quality of
water.
○ yellowish tinge indicates the
presence of chromium and
appreciable amount of organic
matter.
○ Yellowish-red color indicates the
presence of iron;
○ red-brown color indicates the
GRAND PRISMATIC SPRING, presence of peaty matter.
YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK
 TURBIDITY
● due to the colloidal, extremely fine
suspension such as clay, slit, finely
divided matters (organic and
inorganic) micro-organisms like
plankton, etc.
● depends not only on the quantity
of insoluble substances, but also
on their size, shape and refractive
index
Yellow river in China
 ● usually, interlinked directly with odor.
TASTE However, in some waste water, taste is
not accompanied by odor. Thus,
presence of dissolved mineral in water
produces taste, but not odor. For
example;
○ Bitter taste can be due to the presence of
iron, aluminum, manganese, sulphate or
excess of lime.
○ Soapy taste can be due to the presence of
large amount of sodium bicarbonate
○ Brackish taste is due to the presence of
unusual amount of salts.
○ Palatable taste is due to the presence of
dissolved gases (CO2) and minerals (like
nitrates) in water.
ODOR
● undesirable for domestic as well
as industrial purposes.
● caused by the presence of living
organisms, decaying vegetation
including algae, bacteria, fungi
and weeds.
● The receiving water may be
offensive where heavy pollution is
caused by sewage/industrial
effluents.
● The most common disagreeable
odor in water bodies is due to
presence of small quantity of
sulphides.
Chemical impurities of water

acidity Mineral matters Biological matters

The source of this
caused by the presence of
origin from rocks and contamination is discharge of
free CO2, mineral acids
industrial effluents. domestic and sewage wastes,
(e.g., H2SO4) and weakly
excreta (from man, animals
dissociated acids.
and birds) etc.
 ACIDITY
● Acidity is not any specific pollutant and
it simply determines the power to
neutralize hydroxyl ions and is, usually,
expressed in terms of ppm (or mg/L) of
calcium carbonate equivalent.

Acidity of Different Bottled

water
MINERAL MATTERS
Mineral matters have origin from rocks
and industrial effluents. These include
mineral acids, Ca2+, Mg2+, Na+, K+, Fe2+,
CO32-, Mn2+, HC03 - , Cl-, SO42-, N03- , F-,
SiO2 etc. However, from industrial point of
view, alkalinity and hardness are
important.
 BIOLOGICAL MATTERS

● Algae
● Pathogenic bacteria
● Fungi
● Viruses
● Parasite worms

Boracay before the

Rehabilitation
04
Effect of
humans
Ecosystem and landscape changes
(Tampakan Open-pit Mining at South
Cotabato)
SEDIMENTATION
(Claver Mineral Development Corporation
(CMDC) Surigao del Norte)
pollution
(Marcopper mining disaster in Marinduque)
Over-abstraction of water
(kaliwa dam projectin Infanta, Quezon)
CLIMATE CHANGE
SIBALOM RIVER in PANAY
 05
EXCESSIVE
WATER
WITHDRAWAL
dRYING BODIES OF WATER
WATER SHORTAGE
“If there is magic on this planet, it is
contained in water.”

—LOREN EISLEY
 THANKS!
Do you have any questions?

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