Effect of different aging treatments on the transport of nano-biochar in saturated porous media

Abstract

Widely used for soil amendment, carbon sequestration, and remediation of contaminated soils, biochars (BCs) inevitably produce a large number of nanoparticles with relatively high mobility. Geochemical aging alters chemical structure of these nanoparticles and thus affect their colloidal aggregation and transport behavior. In this study, the transport of ramie derived nano-BCs (after ball-milling) was investigated by different aging treatments (i.e., photo (PBC) and chemical aging (NBC)) as well as the managing BC under different physicochemical factors (i.e., flow rates, ionic strengths (IS), pH, and coexisting cations). Consequences of the column experiments indicated aging promoted the mobility of the nano-BCs. Compared to the nonaging BC, consequences of spectroscopic analysis demonstrated the aging BCs exhibited a number of tiny corrosion pores. Both of these aging treatments contribute to a more negative zeta potential and a higher dispersion stability of the nano-BCs, which is caused by the abundance of O-functional groups. Also the specific surface area and mesoporous volume of both aging BCs increased significantly, with the increase being more pronounced for NBC. The breakthrough curves (BTCs) obtained for the three nano-BCs were modelled by the advection-dispersion equation (ADE), which included first-order deposition and release terms. The ADE revealed high mobility of aging BCs, which meant their retention in saturated porous media was reduced. This work contributes to a comprehensive understanding of the transport of aging nano-BCs in the environment.