Groundwater from the middle Banat region (Serbia) which is used as a drinking water supply for Zrenjanin town contains a high amount of natural organic matter and a high content of arsenic. In this study a pilot-scale system was used to investigate the influence of different ozone doses (0.4-0.9 mg O3/mg DOC) during a pre-ozonation process on NOM removal by coagulation. Ferric chloride coagulant was chosen at a dose of 100 g/cubic meter, as a traditional coagulant which can also help in arsenic removal. The obtained results indicate that an ozone dose of 0.4 mg O3/mg DOC has the best influence on structural changes of NOM. The coagulation process with ferric chloride as coagulant had a significant influence on the arsenic content of the water, with the measured values in the water after coagulation in all three investigated treatment trains being below 10 microgram/l, which is the standard MCL in Serbian legislation.

This study investigates removal efficiency of arsenic species from water on natural and modified sorbent materials. Selective removal of As(III) and As(V) from water was carried out with pure natural materials: bentonite, sepiolite, limonite, pyrolusite and zeolite. Materials most commonly used in water treatment, quartz sand and granular active carbon, were modified by iron coating in order to increase its sorption capacity. For the purpose of comparison, commercial material, granular ferry hydroxide (Everzit As), was investigated under the same conditions. The investigations were performed in batch experiments following the standard experimental methodology. Of all the tested natural materials zeolite exhibited significant sorption capacity: 100 microgram As(III, V)/g. Iron coating increased materials sorption capacity for at least 80%. Iron coated sand and iron coated activated carbon exhibited 340 and 430 microgram As(V)/g respectively.