The study of interrelationship between raw water quality parameters, chlorine demand and the formation of disinfection by-products

Disinfection is the most crucial process in the treatment of drinking water supply and is the final barrier against bacteriological impurities in drinking water. Chlorine is the primary disinfectant used in the drinking water treatment process throughout Malaysia. However, the occurrence of various disinfection by-products such as trihalomethanes (THM) and haloacetic acids created a major issue on the potential health hazards which may pose adverse health effects in both human and animals. To simulate real water treatment conditions and to represent the conditions inherent in a tropical country, this study was performed at an urbanized water treatment plant with a daily production of about 549,000 m3 of treated water. The purpose of this work is to examine the relationship between the water quality parameters in the raw water with chlorine demand and the formation of disinfection by-products. This study also investigated the possibility of the statistical model applications for the prediction of chlorine demand and the THM formation. Two models were developed to estimate the chlorine demand and the THM formation. For the statistical evaluation, correlation and simple linear regression analysis were conducted using SPSS. The results of Kolmogorov–Smirnov test for the estimation of goodness-of-fit of the dependent variables of the models to the normal distribution showed that all the dependent variables followed the normal distribution at significance level of 0.05. Good linear correlations were observed between the independent parameters and formation of THM and the chlorine demand. This study also revealed that ammonia and the specific ultraviolet absorbent (SUVA) were the function of chlorine consumption in the treatment process. Chlorine dosage and SUVA increase the yield of THM. Chlorine demand and THM formation was moderately sensitive, but significant to the pH. The level of significance (α) for the statistical tests and the inclusion of a variable in the model was 0.05. A better understanding of these relationships will help the water utilities or plant operators to minimize the THM formation, providing a healthier and better drinking water quality as well as optimizing the chlorine dosage in the disinfection process.