Effect of Some Physical, and Chemical Variables on Flocculation and Sediment Behaviour

Abstract

Effect of some chemical and physical variables on the settling rate, final sediment height, sediment viscosity and supernatant turbidity of a clay sample was studied using various polyacrylamide type flocculants. Increasing flocculant concentration significantly increased both the settling rate and sediment viscosity. More importantly, changes in the final sediment, height, hence the packing density, was minimal for all the conditions tested once the sediment was allowed to consolidate. Also, the mode of addition of the polymer, at once or continuous, did not seem to affect any of the parameters measured. Conditioning time seemed to alter the settling rate at low polymer concentrations, but had no effect at high polymer concentrations. However, increasing the conditioning time caused a decrease in the sediment viscosity. Different types of the polyacrylimides generated different settling rates at a given concentration, but the final sediment height was nearly independent of polymer type.