Removal of Ammonia From Water Using a Modified Porous Material Danielle O’Hagan, Marcia Silva* *Corresponding author: msilva@uwm.edu

Abstract Today’s commercial fertilizers can cause stress on the environment, particularly stress on aquatic life when certain contaminates leach into the water ways. There are various ways ammonia can enter the aquatic environment, such as runoff from agricultural lands, nitrogenous wastes from animals, and municipal discharges among other things. Current methods of ammonia filtration can be costly, which causes a need for a new method to be developed. The focus of this research is on engineering a novel porous material for the removal of ammonia, which would be suitable for today’s industries. The possible applications of a successful material would be in agricultural situations and municipal discharging.

Environmental Concerns There is a natural balance of Ammonium Hydroxide present in aquatic ecosystems. When the balance is disrupted ammonium forms ammonia, becoming toxic to the surrounding environment. This has impact on many forms of life including: Crops Aquatic Life Live Stock

Experimental Methods Fabrication and testing of adsorption capacity of the material was conducted utilizing column experiments and color spectrophotometry to detect levels of ammonia present. Breakthrough curves were analyzed to determine adsorption capacity.

(Mg/L)

Literature Cited Li, Mingyu, Xiaoqiang Zhu, Fenghua Zhu, Gang Ren, and Gang Cao. "Application of modified zeolite for ammonium removal from drinking water." Elsevier, 1 Feb. 2011. Accessed 8 Apr. 2018. McMcKague, Kevin. "Environmental Impacts of Nitrogen Use in Agriculture." Ontario Ministry of Agricultural, Food, and Rural Affairs , Nov. 2005. Accessed 8 Apr. 2018.