Surface modified granular activated carbon for enhancement of nickel adsorption from aqueous solution

Abstract

Coal-based granular activated carbon was modified with acetates of sodium, potassium and lithium at concentrations of 10 and 15% and used as adsorbents to explore the adsorption mechanism of nickel ion in aqueous solution. Acetate treatment reduced surface area and pore volume of the activated carbons, but the adsorption amount of Ni(II) on the modified activated carbons (MAC) was greater than that on the virgin activated carbon. The adsorption depended on pH of the solution with an optimum at 4.5 and the adsorbed nickel could be fully desorbed by using 0.05 M HCl solution. The maximum adsorption capacity of nickel ion on Li (15 wt%) modified activated carbon was 151.3 mg/g and the adsorption isotherm follows Langmuir, Sips, and Redlich-Peterson isotherm models better than the Freundlich isotherm model. The kinetic data was better fitted by a non-linear form of the pseudo-first order than the pseudo-second order, but the difference between two kinetic models was small.

Studying the Effect of Operating Parameters on the Removal of Nickel Ion from an Adsorber by Using COMSOL Multiphysics Simulation

“…For Ni removal from drinking water, PAC and GAC have higher efficiency and high economical function [22].Activated carbon has maximum surface area value of 2000 m 2 /g and density 500 g/ml at dry condition for both powder activated carbon (PAC) and granular activate carbon (GAC) [23].Activated carbon is used to remove heavy metals such as Pb, Ni and Cu from drinking water as motioned in Kadirvelu et al [24]investigation. Activated carbon adsorption efficiency depends mainly upon the high surface area which is promotes higher amount of micro-size pores in additions to acidic behavior of adsorption solid surface forms typical bonds between adsorption and solute molecules such as Ni [17].In addition to higher surface area per gram, activated carbon has higher class porosity development with multi-spectrum of structure functional groups which promotes higher pollutant cleaning rate [25]. While activated carbon/ silica composite was used to remove heavy metals [25].…”