Effectiveness of coffee on removal of water

Introduction

A few years ago, the problems with dirty water arise, the demand for heavy metals has been rocketed, the waste metal has flowed into the environment from the surrounding activities from industrial activities (Castro et al. 2011).   Some other pollution comes from the vaporization of water and atmospheric deposition. The corrosion of pipe is also considered where copper is flowed in with the water contaminating it. It can cause loads of health issues such as liver deterioration and can be fatal (Castro et al. 2011).

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There is a significant number of treatments for this contamination. Absorption also prevented by the membrane filtering method (Castro et al. 2011).. The other method involves the use of electrochemistry to separate the metals from its contaminated water. Absorption takes place in the membrane, which is the process of dumping onto the surface of the layer. Even though there may be loads of methods to clean the dirt, filtering using membrane is costly, which means these pores are needed to change on a daily bases after it has been contaminated (Castro et al. 2011)..

Apart from these costly treatment methods, there are some other green alternative solutions to these problems. Organic stuff like coffee grounds, fruits waste, and peanut shells have carboxyl groups with help with the removal of heavy metal ions like copper ions from water (Castro et al. 2011). In this report, coffee grounds are used to carry out the experiments as it is less costly and much abundant in the atmosphere.

Aim

This experiment aims to find out the effect of changing the mass of coffee ground will affect the concentration of copper ions. More copper ions will be absorbed if more coffee grounds were used. Mass of copper is the independent variable in this experiment as masses are changed to test the effect. The dependent variable is the number of copper ions removed. The operations were controlled by taking some factors into account. Starting concentration of Cu, which is 10 ppm, the amount of buffer and dye solutions, the waiting time and swirling time, pH, temperature, the speed setting for vortex mixer are kept the same.

Materials and Method

In order to graph a calibration curve, three different masses of coffee grounds are used; 0.1000 g, 0.3000 g, and 0.5000 g. After weighing to the desired mass, coffee grounds were transferred to a centrifuge tube. Each mass was repeated three times which means there are three coffee samples for each mass. 10 ml of 10 ppm Cu2+ solution was dispensed into each tube. A vortex mixer is used to shake the tube for 10 seconds. Solutions are rested for 10 minutes to allow some chemical reactions. Then, they are filtered into a specimen via by using filter paper. After that, 5 mL of sodium ethanoate solution and 5mL of Alizarin Red solution are added to each vial. The vials are swirled to mix the solutions. In order to measure the absorbance, a small amount of sample solution is placed into a cuvette by using s spectrophotometer. Repeat this process for each solution. There are nine solutions in total. The absorbance values are recorded in the lab manual. The values can later be transferred into the excel spreadsheet.

Materials

Dried coffee grounds

9x centrifuge tubes

9x 25mL sample vials

Cuvette

Sodium acetate buffer

Alizarin red solution

Each of different concentration of a standard copper solution ( 0.5 ppm, 2 ppm, 1 ppm, 5ppm, and 10 ppm)

Analytical balance

Vortex

Filter papers and ring stand

Spectrophotometer

Weighing boats

Part A Calibration Curve

Firstly, six sample vials are collected and are labeled (A-F). 10 mL of deionized water was measured into the first vial (labelled A). 10 mL of each copper solution is dispensed into five separate vials (B-F). 5ml of sodium acetate solution and alizarin solution are poured into each labeled sample vials. The vials are then closed with a lid and are agitated by using vortex for 15 seconds. Using a spectrophotometer, the absorbance of each solution was measured.

To use the spectrophotometer, firstly, Sample vial A (which contains buffer and dye) is added to the cuvette after rinsing with deionized water for two times. The spectrophotometer is tared to zero. The cuvette is placed into the spectrophotometer with the arrow pointing to the left and the strip side placing to the front. Kim wipe is used to wipe any fingerprints which could alter the absorbance readings. Measurements are recorded after allowing some fluctuations to become stationary. Then, Readings are recorded on the excel spreadsheet. Repeat the same process for the other solutions (B-F).

Part B Removal of Copper ions

Secondly, in order to graph a calibration curve, three different masses of coffee grounds are used; 0.1000 g, 0.3000 g, and 0.5000 g. A weighing boat is tared to zero by using an analytical balance. In order to get an accurate result, the masses were recorded to 4 significant figures. The surface of the analytical balance was cleaned with a brush to remove any leftover coffee grounds, which could affect the measurement.

After weighing the masses and getting the desired mass, coffee grounds were transferred to a centrifuge tube. Centrifuges were labeled (A-C) for each mass. Each mass was repeated three times so that there are three coffee samples for each mass. 10 ml of 10 ppm Cu2+ solution was dispensed into each tube. A vortex mixer is used to shake the tubes for 10 seconds. Solutions were rested for 10 minutes to allow some chemical reactions.

Then, they are filtered into a specimen via by using filter paper. After that, 5 mL of sodium ethanoate solution and 5mL of Alizarin Red solution are added to each labeled sample vial. The vials are swirled to mix the solutions. In order to measure the absorbance, a small amount of sample solution is placed into a cuvette by using s spectrophotometer. The measurement was started by using the lowest mass, which is 0.1000g (0.1A) in this experiment. The cuvette must be rinsed twice by using the same solutions to be measured.

 Repeat this process for the remaining solutions. There were nine solutions in total. The absorbance values are recorded in the lab manual. Then, the results were shown to the lab demonstrator and were transferred into the excel spreadsheet.

Results

Copper Concentration (ppm)

Absorbance

0

0.004

0.5

0.018

1

0.046

2

0.128

5

0.301

10

0.547

Table 1: Calibration data

Figure 1: Absorbance vs concentration of copper solution.

Part B: Removal of copper ions

Replicate (n= XX*)

Original Copper Concentration (ppm)

Final Copper Concentration (ppm)

% Copper Removed

Std Dev

0.1000

10

8.406

15.94

0.083141089

0.3000

10

7.205

27.95

0.311779083

0.5000

10

6.203

37.97

0.226502252

References

Castro, R.S.D., Caetano, L., Ferreira, G., Padilha, P.M., Saeki, M.J., Zara, L.F., Martines, M.A.U. & Castro, G.R. 2011, ‘Banana Peel Applied to the Solid Phase Extraction of Copper and Lead from River Water: Preconcentration of Metal Ions with a Fruit Waste’, Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Research, vol. 50, no. 6, pp. 3446-51.