Research project "Young Scientist Exchange Program" (German – Israeli Cooperation in Water Technology Research)

Removal of organic contaminants from water using complexes of montmorillonite with micelle-like humic acids and plant cuticles

Partners:
- The HEBREW UNIVERSITY OF JERUSALEM (IL)
- The Seagram Centre for Soil and Water Science (IL)

Funding:  Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF)

Duration:  April - September 2007

Researchers:  Prof. Dr. Peter Werner, Dr.-Ing. Catalin Stefan, Dr.-Ing. Michael Selle

Project Description:

The intensive use of pharmaceuticals in the fight against diseases in both humans and animals, leads to an increased input of these substances into the environment. Conventional treatment technologies can only remove these substances incompletely. Therefore, there is a need to develop new, more efficient technologies for the purification of polluted waters.

One possibility is to research new sorption materials for the complete removal of pharmaceuticals. Sorption processes significantly determine the transport behavior of pollutants in the environment. Clay and loam components form a natural sorption material which, in combination with humic substances, forms "organo-clay complexes".

The focus was on the one hand on increasing the sorption capacity of these natural complexes by ion exchange processes and on the other hand on determining the adsorption, desorption and resorption properties of polar and non-polar pollutants on these organo-clay complexes.