Aloe vera as Disinfectant for Drinking Water Purpose

Abstract

Disinfection is an important water treatment process used to remove all bacterial impurities present in water. In this study, the effectiveness of a natural disinfectant derived from Aloe vera species for removal of E. coli from natural water and synthetic water containing E. coli were evaluated using spread plate method and membrane filter technique. Significant reduction in bacterial load was seen in batch test for all the range. For 20, 25, 30 and 35ml dose of Aloe vera 94.74%, 93.68 %, 94.17 % and 97.08% removal of E.coli concentration were obtained in Batch test. Hence, contact time was considered to be 19, 14, 10 and 6 hour for 20, 25, 30, 35ml dose of Aloe vera respectively. For continuous flow, 6 hour detention time was taken to design a sedimentation tank. Effectiveness of Aloe vera as disinfectant was analyzed for 0-25, 25-50, 50-75, 75-100 CFU/100ml range at distance of 0.2, 0.4, 0.6, 0.8 and 1m. It was obtained that for flowrate of 9.00, 10.28 and 12.00L/hr there was 84.11%, 91.39% and 93.78% removal of E. coli load respectively. For 0-25 CFU/100ml there was 100% reduction in E. coli load. In conclusion, the study indicates that Aloe vera has the potential merits for reduction of bacterial contamination in water.