Keratan Akhbar The Star – Sungai Kim Kim Coming Back To Life

THESTAR.COM 22 APRIL 2022

Sungai Kim Kim coming back to life

Friday, 22 Apr 2022

Samples from Sungai Kim Kim, Pasir Gudang collected to determine the river’s water quality.

SUNGAI Kim Kim, which made headlines in March 2019 due to toxic water pollution affecting over 6,000 people in Pasir Gudang, is now far cleaner, based on recent testing.

Universiti Tun Hussein Onn Malaysia (UTHM) lecturer Dr Nor Amani Filzah Mohd Kamil from the Civil Engineering and Built Environment Faculty said this finding was based on the average score per taxon (ASPT) technique, which was a more suitable and cost-effective method to determine river water quality.

The method calculated the macroinvertebrates present in water samples, she added.

“We have conducted a programme at Sungai Kim Kim together with the Pasir Gudang District Education Office due to several previous pollution cases,” she said.

The results for Sungai Kim Kim, she said, revealed that the river was in the “almost clean to very clean water range”.

Sungai Kim Kim had been the site of repeated chemical pollution, including in August last year.

Nor Amani Filzah added that samples from organisms living in the river such as phytoplankton, fish and macroinvertebrates were collected.

“Macroinvertebrates are animals without a backbone that can be seen with the naked eye.

“ASPT is a technique used to score macroinvertebrate species based on their tolerance to pollution levels,” she said.

“This method of in-situ investigation only requires simple sampling equipment, mainly fishnets, tray, pipette or spoon as well as petri dish,” she said when contacted at the univerity campus in Batu Pahat, Johor.

Nor Amani Filzah said the scoring was based on a book published by the Drainage and Irrigation Department, which contained the species’ names and scores for each organism.

The classification of water quality based on bioindicators range from 0-0.9 (very dirty), 1.0-2.5 (dirty), 2.6-5.0 (almost dirty), 5.1-7.5 (almost clean) and 7.6-10 (very clean).

Another method to check on river water quality, she said, was laboratory analyses, but it required high technology and more costs.