Removal of heavy metal mixtures from wastewater of electroplating industry

Wastewater from electroplating industries caused major hindrance to inland water pollution
due to the presence of heavy metals. Current method administered to remove heavy metals
content from the solution was hydroxide precipitation with aid of coagulation-flocculation process. This method chosen due to simplicity of treatment process and low operational cost. The present investigations only deal with removal of single metal because of simple treatment control and easily to achieve high removal. Therefore, this investigation only cope to remove multi-metals (Copper, cadmium, zinc) from synthetic wastewater which prepared according to the real wastewater from electroplating industries. Jar test was conducted on two different parameters which were initial pH of wastewater and coagulant dose. Results obtained from this study shows that highest removal (Cu = 99.99%, Cd = 99.73%, Zn = 99.89%) at pH 10 with coagulant dosage of 140 mg/L. The industrial treatment method was performed to compare the optimum condition between both methods. The result shows the optimum condition for removal was at pH 12 with dosage of FeCl3 at 970 mg/L (Cu = 99.97%, Cd = 99.98%, Zn = 99.87%). The selected data obtained was fitted using multilinear regression via Excel Software. The regression analysis shows adjusted R² obtained indicates best fitting of data. The ANOVA analysis proved that the mathematical expression can be used to predict removal of multi-metals from an aqueous solution.