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The groundwater in dry zone areas of Sri Lanka has a high fluoride content. This study was launched to develop a low cost household filter to remove excess fluoride from the drinking water.

TitleLow cost fluoride removal by an upward flow household filter
Publication TypeJournal Article
Year of Publication1995
AuthorsPadmasiri, JP, Fonseka, WSCA, Liyanapatabendi, T
Paginationp. 59-64: 4 fig., 3 tab.
Date Published1995-10-01
Keywordscab96/1, field studies, fluoride removal, household appliances, laboratory testing, local materials, point-of-use treatment, sri lanka, upflow filtration
Abstract

The groundwater in dry zone areas of Sri Lanka has a high fluoride content. This study was launched to develop a low cost household filter to remove excess fluoride from the drinking water. An upward flow filter was designed using locally available broken bricks as the filter medium and coconut shell charcoal for odour removal. The filter costs US$ 20 and can hold 16 litres of water. Laboratory tests showed that the fluoride content could be reduced from 4 mg/l to less than 1 mg/l (this conforms to WHO standards) when the filter was operated in a batch mode whereby 8 litres of water were withdrawn at 8 hour intervals. Field trials with 12 filter units were carried out in several villages in 1994. Although all but one of the filters initially reduced fluoride levels from up to 4.2 mg/l to less than 1.0 mg/l, after sixty days of operation only about 20 per cent of the fluoride was still removed.

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