Characterization of adsorbent derived from Coconut Husk and Silica (SiO2)

Abstract

Activated carbon is one of the most commonly used adsorbents because of its high adsorption effectiveness. However, an adsorbent with one type of activated carbon causes a lacking of adsorption efficiency. Therefore, in this study we prepared activated carbon from two types of raw materials. The type of raw material is a combination of coconut husk and silica with several products of activated carbon that contained coconut husk and silica with mass ratio of 70:30, coconut husk with and without activation and pure silica (SiO2). In this study, raw materials were physically heated at 800 °C for 2 hours and chemically activated with H2SO4 solution for 2 hours. FTIR analysis identified a chemical group of Si-O in adsorbent at 898,83 – 1442,74 cm-1. XRD analysis showed that the prepared activated carbon of combination coconut husk:silica; coconut husk with activation; coconut husk without activation and pure silica had silica (SiO2) composition of 83%; 75%; 62.4% and 63.2%, respectively. The water content in activated carbon of combination coconut:silica; coconut husk with activation; coconut husk without activation and pure silica (SiO2) was 4.41%; 3.87%; 3.21% and 2.71%, respectively and the ash content was 3.9%, 2.04%; 1.86% and 0.32% respectively. Both water content and ash content met Indonesian National Standard (SNI) No. 06-3730-1995 with the maximum of ash and water content was 10% and 15%.