Highlights
Biofertilizer was produced by aerobic composting method.
Actinomycetes isolated was found to be good agents for biofertilizer synthesis.
Organic matter and Carbon content of the composts was found to be decreasing.
Nitrogen contents increased significantly with time.
Leaf area index revealed 10th week as the optimum growth period for
Maize
and
Okra
.
The viscosity of oil-based drilling mud was optimized and modeled in this study. Imported bentonite and local clay additives, and diesel oil (base fluid) were used to prepare two muds; oil-based mud with bentonite (OBMB) and oil-based mud with clay (OBMC). The local clay was beneficiated with hydrochloric acid (HCl) and then characterized using an x-ray fluorescence (XRF) spectrometer. The result of the characterization revealed that the local clay is more silica (SiO2) than kaolin. The interactive effects of three operating conditions, temperature, aging time, and bentonite/clay dosage, respectively, on the viscosity of each mud were determined. The Response surface methodology (RSM) of the central composite design tool of Design Expert software (version 12) was employed to optimize the viscosity of each mud. The RSM carried out revealed the interaction between the three operating variables of temperature, time, and dosage of bentonite/clay and their impact on the viscosity of each mud. Optimum viscosity of 19.3 cP for OBMB and 25.9 for OBMC were obtained at temperature of 313K, aging time of 30 minutes and bentonite/clay dosage of 9 wt%. Analysis of variants (ANOVA), mathematical modeling, and graphical plots further established the actual interaction between the response-viscosity of each mud and the considered process factors. The generated models revealed linear, interactive, and quadratic equations which adequately described the relationship between the viscosity of each mud and the considered factors of temperature, time, and dosage. The experimental data and the predicted results were compared, and the model predicted values are in good agreement with the experimental results. Doi: 10.28991/HEF-2021-02-04-09 Full Text: PDF
This work focuses on the removal of oil from polluted water surface using activated biomass such as ogbono shell. The shell was carbonized at a temperature of 600 o C for 4h and then further modified with stearic acid. Characterization of the adsorbent produced was carried out using Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) to study the surface morphology of raw and grafted ogbono shell. Fourier Transform Infra-red Spectroscopy (FTIR) was used to investigated the functional group of different minerals. Proximate analysis was carried out to determine the surface area of the agro wastes before and after modification. Batch experiments were carried out to investigate the effects of the oil water ratio, temperature, pH and contact time on the sorption capacities of the adsorbents. Physiochemical characterization of the adsorbents revealed that surface area increased from 114 cm 2 to 190.5 cm 2 after modification. SEM and FTIR results revealed that more micro porous surfaces were created on the surface of the adsorbent after modification. Batch adsorption experiments with esterified ogbono shell revealed that 96% of crude oil was removed at a pH of 5 with oil water ratio of 1.4/100 cm 3 after 50 min at a temperature of 90 o C. Esterified ogbono shell was found to be a good adsorbent for the removal of oil layer from polluting water surface.
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