'We don't see agricultural residue as waste': U of S researchers tackling Sask.'s arsenic problem in water
A team of chemical engineering scholars at the University of Saskatchewan (U of S) are tinkering with agricultural waste, to create water filters that remove harmful chemicals such as arsenic from drinking water and wastewater.
Using the synchrotron at the Canadian Light Source (CLS), along with funding from the province’s Agricultural Development Fund, engineers were able to look at agricultural waste such as wheat and canola straw on a microscopic level, to study how this residue absorbs toxins in water.
Jafar Soltan, professor of chemical and biological engineering at U of S said the research into removing harmful chemicals from water could be used at the industry level, to help mining companies clean up tailings from mine sites, but it can also be used at the municipal level, helping communities such as First Nations reserves and clean drinking water supplies.
“Our initial thought was the industry that is dealing with tailings, so we could find these filters … something you pass the water through or you put the filter in the lake and it grabs the pollutants,” Soltan said. “Now we’re looking at a wider range of applications, maybe drinking water, surface water flowing through communities and we want to treat it. We can translate this science into technology.”
Khaled Zoroufchi Benis, a Ph.D. candidate in chemical engineering at U of S says arsenic is a harmful carcinogen found in many sources of water in Saskatchewan, and his research focuses on ways to develop environmentally-friendly filtration systems to get the harmful toxins out.
“We know we have an arsenic problem in our water in Saskatchewan, in drinking water in some rural areas and also in northern Saskatchewan and in the mining industry,” Zoroufchi Benis said.
He added U of S is collaborating with the mining industry to see how agricultural-based residue filtration systems can help remove arsenic from uranium wastewater. But, Zoroufchi Benis is also looking at how this natural filtration system could be used to comb out pharmaceutical chemicals from water systems.
If his research is adopted by technology and used as a new form of water filtration, the country’s agricultural sector could see a big opportunity to recycle its waste into something useful.
“We don’t see agricultural residue as waste, it’s more valuable and in the future we will hear a lot about using agricultural residue not just in water treatment but other applications like energy generation,” Zoroufchi Benis said.
According to an annual report from Saskatchewan’s Water Security Agency, who regularly test Saskatchewan water for chemicals including arsenic, of all the testing for arsenic resulting from regular required sampling, there were 32 instances of arsenic exceedances that occurred in samples from 15 human consumptive systems in 2020, according to its report.
Additional voluntary arsenic testing was conducted by 10 human consumptive municipal systems, resulting in 66 additional exceedances.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
Parents of infant who died in wrong-way crash on Ontario's Hwy. 401 were in same vehicle
Ontario’s Special Investigations Unit has released new details about a wrong-way collision in Whitby on Monday night that claimed the lives of four people.
Three Quebec men from same family father hundreds of children
Three men in Quebec from the same family have fathered more than 600 children.
Jurors in Trump hush money trial hear recording of pivotal call on plan to buy affair story
Jurors in the hush money trial of Donald Trump heard a recording Thursday of him discussing with his then-lawyer and personal fixer a plan to purchase the silence of a Playboy model who has said she had an affair with the former president.
B.C. mayor stripped of budget, barred from committees over Indigenous residential schools book
A British Columbia mayor has been censured by city council – stripping him of his travel and lobbying budgets and removing him from city committees – for allegedly distributing a book that questions the history of Indigenous residential schools in Canada.
New scam targets Canada Carbon Rebate recipients
Fake text message and email campaigns trying to get money and information out of unsuspecting Canadian taxpayers have started circulating, just months after the federal government rebranded the carbon tax rebate the Canada Carbon Rebate.
Universities grapple with the complicated politics of campus encampments
Montreal police are facing pressure to move in and dismantle a pro-Palestinian encampment on McGill University campus on Thursday, as a growing number of universities across this country grapple with the tough decision of how to handle the protests.
Police order B.C. woman who praised Hamas not to protest for 5 months, says her group
A pro-Palestinian activist group says its international co-ordinator, who was arrested in a Vancouver hate-crime investigation, was released with an order not to attend any protests for the next five months.
Conservative MP says Chinese hacking attack targeted his personal email
A Conservative MP is challenging claims by House of Commons administration that a China-backed hacking attempt did not impact any members of Parliament, because the attack was on his personal email.
Loblaw leaders call criticism 'misguided,' say they aren't to blame for high food prices
Loblaw chairman Galen Weston and the company's new CEO are pushing back against critics who blame the grocery giant for soaring food prices, as a month-long boycott of the retailer gets underway.