The Removal of Ibuprofen Drugs Residues from Municipal Wastewater by Moringa Oleifera Seeds

Municipal wastewater may contain residues of different drugs causing severe chemical contamination of water bodies. However, the microbial degradation of Wastewater Treatment Plants (WWTP) may not eliminate such drug residues completely. The current work was designed to remove the Ibuprofen drug residues by using the Moringa Oleifera seeds. Various testing methods such as Brunauer, Emmett and Teller (BET), Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR) were applied to assess the efficiency of such plant seeds in bioremoval of ibuprofen residues from municipal wastewater The batch reactor was used to find the optimum operating conditions using various parameters with different pH values, duration time, Ibuprofen concentration and various quantities of plant seeds. In the batch reactor, the operation conditions were: pH 7, duration time 150 min, Ibuprofen dose of 1000 mg/l, activated adsorbents and Moringa Oleifera seeds in the amount of 1000 mg/l. Moreover, the packed bed reactor was used to examine different parameters such as initial Ibuprofen concentration, flow rate and bed depth for 6 hours. It was found that the best conditions were 2 cm depth, and 25 l/hr flow rate. Meanwhile, the kinetic constants were studied by adsorption equilibrium with the isothermal Langmuir and Freundlich models. The best results were shown with the Freundlich isotherm, and the first pseudo order was more suitable for the removal of Ibuprofen by adsorbed activation of Moringa Oleifera seeds