Analysis of Citarum River pollution indicator using chemical, physical, and bacteriological methods

Citarum River is the longest and largest river in West Java. Citarum River has a strategic role in the life of the community, such as a source of irrigation, a raw source of drinking water companies (PDAM), and water sources for 3 reservoirs/dams. However, Citarum River is indicated as one of the highly polluted rivers in the world. Source of pollution comes from industrial waste, household, agriculture, fishery, and other activities. Along the 297 km of the stream, there are 18 million inhabitants and over 2700 industries, some of dispose their waste into the river. The purpose of this study is to determine the level of water pollution of the Citarum River in the downstream area, Karawang Regency, West Java. This research was conducted using chemical, physics, and bacteriological analysis method. Preliminary research was conducted to find out the indicator values such as E-coli, BOD, COD, and turbidity level in the downstream of Citarum River. Preliminary result shows that the clean water threshold was exceeded with E-coli levels reaching 1600/100 ml, BOD 10 mg/liter, COD 19 mg/liter, and turbidity with 320 NTU scores exceeding the clean water threshold (12.8 times the normal). This research shows that Citarum River water is not a feasible source for PDAM raw water and must be processed before becoming drinkable water. Therefore, this research also studied on a water purification model with allophane composites, zeolites, quartz sand, or activated carbon.