Detrimental Impact of Plastic Outcome on Agriculture

Generally, plastic is made up of non-biodegradable chemicals i.e. polyolefin, polyester, and polyurethanes. This is hardly surprising since the use of polythene bags has infiltrated all sectors of economy, agriculture, consumer goods, and especially in packaging, where polythene is increasingly replacing jute, paper, wood, and glass. Polythene bags can release harmful chemicals into the surrounding agricultural soil, which can then seep into ground water or other surrounding water sources. This can cause serious harm to the species that drink this water. Unlike natural organic material they do not disintegrate with time but keep accumulating in the environment. So it is very difficult to dispose of the polythene bags. If the polythene bags burned in agriculture land, they release harmful chemicals like Cd, Pb, CO, NOX and SO2, which causes many diseases in animals as well as in human beings. The accumulation of polythene bags also makes agricultural soil sterile/barren as it stops the gaseous exchange. In normal agricultural land, the concentration of oxygen is 3 ppm. Where polythene is present, the concentration of oxygen in soil decreases to 0.001 ppm. In addition, the polythene pollution can adversely affect agricultural lands, waterways, and oceans.

Adsorption of geosmin and 2-methylisoborneol onto granular activated carbon in water: isotherms, thermodynamics, kinetics, and influencing factors

Adsorption was found to be an acceptable treatment option to remove geosmin (GSM) and 2-methylisoborneol (2-MIB). It is meaningful to investigate the adsorption capacity of granular activated carbon (GAC) for the two algal odorants in water, and the influences of natural organic material (NOM) and particle size. The adsorption process was studied with the four isotherm models (Langmuir, Freundlich, Temkin, and modified Freundlich), four kinetic models (pseudo first-order, pseudo second-order, Elovich, and intra-particle), and thermodynamics. The results showed that the adsorption of both compounds could be best described by the modified Freundlich isotherm and pseudo second-order model, and the obtained thermodynamic parameters (changes in heat of adsorption, entropy, and Gibbs free energy) revealed that the adsorption was endothermic and spontaneous. Downsizing the particle size of GAC was effective for improving the adsorption capacity and rate. The concentrations of the two odorants could be reduced from 500 ng L−1 to less than 10 ng L−1 with the presence of NOM (<20 mg L−1 total organic carbon, TOC).

Alternative Approach to Conventional River Water Treatment Using Natural Coagulant

Extensive studies have been conducted to discover natural, efficient and cost-saving coagulants for water treatment. Meanwhile, chemical coagulants are being used conventionally in drinking water treatment. This study investigates the efficacy of diatomite as a natural coagulant in river water treatment. First, synthetic turbid water was used to validate the coagulant efficiency. Then, coagulation and flocculation behaviors were studied by using the river water samples from Langat River and Semenyih River. Turbidity removal efficiency of synthetic turbid water revealed that a low dosage of 3.5 mg/L could reach turbidity reduction of 83.46%. The turbidity reduction for Semenyih River water with initial turbidity of 31.8 NTU was achieved at 91.7% with 18 mg/L dosage at pH of 7.4 whereby, for Langat River water with an initial turbidity of 43.3 NTU, the turbidity reduction was achieved at 94.5% with a dosage of 26 mg/L at pH of 8.0. These results showed that water turbidity removal was influenced by both high and low natural organic material. This is because the best dosage of coagulant is indirectly proportional to the molar mass of natural organic material. In conclusion, diatomite is a promising material to be used as a natural coagulant in water treatment applications.

ANALYSIS FOR POTENCY AND PRODUCTION OF GRANULE ORGANIC FERTILIZER BASED ON MANURE

Organic materials that are generally used as raw material for organic fertilizer granules (POG) is a natural organic material that has been degrade, smooth and dry. One of the main raw materials are always used with a very high percentage of usage, is manure. Manure potential in Indonesia is very high, amounting to 113.6 million tons per year, or 64.7 million tons per year to the island of Java. From this amount, it will be generated numbers POG production potential of 17.5 million tons per year (total Indonesia) or 9.9 million tons per year for the island of Java. While the realistic POG production predictions figures made from raw manure is 2.5 million tons annually, a figure that has been unable to meet the number requirement of POG greater than 4 million tons per year. Therefore, in producing POG, it should be to maximize the using of the potential of other organic materials so that the use of manure can be saved. With the use of a small amount of manure (maximum 30% for cow manure), it would be useful also to avoid the production of POG with high Fe content.keywods: organic material, manure, granule organic fertilizer

INFLUENCE OF STICKY RICE AND ANIONIC POLYACRYLAMIDE ON THE CRYSTALLIZATION OF CALCIUM CARBONATE IN CHINESE ORGANIC SANHETU

The crystallization of calcium carbonate ( CaCO 3) in soil controlled by natural organic material was considered a very important reason to enhance the property of ancient Chinese organic Sanhetu (COS), but how the organic material affected the crystallization of CaCO 3 in COS is still unclear. In this paper, a natural organic material (sticky rice, SR) and a synthetic organic material (anionic polyacrylamide, APAM) were selected as additives to investigate their effect on the crystallization of CaCO 3. The experimental results showed that the morphology and size of CaCO 3 crystals could be affected by the concentration of additives and reaction time, while only the size of CaCO 3 crystals could be affected by the concentration of reactant. Although the morphology and size of CaCO 3 crystals varied greatly with the variation of additive concentration, reactant concentration and reaction time, the polymorph of CaCO 3 crystals were always calcite, according to SEM/EDX, XRD and FTIR analyses. This study may help us to better understand the mechanism of the influence of organic materials on CaCO 3 crystallization and properties of COS.

Carbon Nanotube Modified Electrically Conductive Cellulose Film

In recent decades, the energy resource and environment pollution is becoming a main challenge for the sustainability of global economic development as a result of population growth and industrial development. Costs of the synthetic materials are rising due to the short supply of fossil oil. Meanwhile the synthetic materials are not biodegradable and renewable. So the materials with biodegradable and renewable properties need to be investigated. With an annual yield of about 7 × 1011 tones, cellulose is the Earth’s most abundant natural organic material [1]. Many methods and chemicals have been developed to process cellulose into different products [2–6].