Avaliação experimental da transferência de oxigênio para a água induzida pelo efeito do vento

Abstract

Environmental problems are issues that deserve the attention of the scientific community, since natural resources are limited. Pollution of water bodies is directly related to the low level of dissolved oxygen in water, which is a key element for maintaining aquatic life and reducing water treatment costs. In view of the needs for maintaining water quality, this research was based on the main objective of evaluating, on a laboratory scale, the rates of oxygen transfer to water caused by different conditions of wind speed. For this to happen, several experiments were carried out at the Laboratory of Water Resources — LRH of the Department of Hydraulic and Environmental Engineering — DEHA of UFC. Based on these experiments, a data analysis was carried out, through the generation of graphs and correlations with existing data in the literature, aiming to better understand the process of self-purification of water bodies. Therefore, it was found that for a wind speed variation range between 3.8 m/s and 7.4 m/s, the aeration coefficient (k2) can be considered approximately constant and with a value of 0.016 min-1. Thus, it was possible to quantify the influence of wind speed on the process of incorporation of oxygen in the water, for the range of speeds studied.