Hydrous cerium oxides coated glass fiber for efficient and long-lasting arsenic removal from drinking water

Ronghui Li,Weiyi Yang,Qi Li,Shuang Gao,Jianku Shang

doi:10.1007/s40145-020-0435-0

Abstract

A novel arsenic adsorbent with hydrous cerium oxides coated on glass fiber cloth (HCO/GFC) was synthesized. The HCO/GFC adsorbents were rolled into a cartridge for arsenic removal test. Due to the large pores between the glass fibers, the arsenic polluted water can flow through easily. The arsenic removal performance was evaluated by testing the equilibrium adsorption isotherm, adsorption kinetics, and packed-bed operation. The pH effects on arsenic removal were conducted. The test results show that HCO/GFC filter has high As(V) and As(III) removal capacity even at low equilibrium concentration. The more toxic As(III) in water can be easily removed within a wide range of solution pH without pre-treatment. Arsenic contaminated ground-water from Yangzong Lake (China) was used in the column test. At typical breakthrough conditions (the empty bed contact time, EBCT = 2 min), arsenic researched breakthrough at over 24,000 bed volumes (World Health Organization (WHO) suggested that the maximum contaminant level (MCL) for arsenic in drinking water is 10 mg/L). The Ce content in the treated water was lower than 5 ppb during the column test, which showed that cerium did not leach from the HCO/GFC material into the treated water. The relationship between dosage of adsorbents and the adsorption kinetic model was also clarified, which suggested that the pseudo second order model could fit the kinetic experimental data better when the adsorbent loading was relatively low, and the pseudo first order model could fit the kinetic experimental data better when the adsorbent loading amount was relatively high.

Highlights

Arsenic contamination of water bodies (ground/surfaceJ Adv Ceram 2021, 10(2): 247–257 drinking water should not be over 10 μg/L [2]
Of CeO2 nanoparticles was determined at ~4 nm from the strongest X-ray diffraction (XRD) peak (111) by the Scherrer’s formula: D = 0.9λ/(βcosθ) where λ is the average wavelength of the X-ray radiation, β is the line-width at half-maximum peak position, and θ is the diffracting angle
This study offered a low-cost and simple method for the synthesis of hydrous CeO2 nanoparticles attached on glass fiber adsorbents which have good arsenic removal performance and the potential industrial applicability

Summary

Introduction

J Adv Ceram 2021, 10(2): 247–257 drinking water should not be over 10 μg/L [2]. it is important to remove excess arsenic species effectively from drinking water to guarantee the health of millions of people living near arsenic contaminated water bodies. Hydrous CeO2 nanoparticles had demonstrated a superior arsenic adsorption performance for both As(III) and As(V) especially for drinking water treatment [20], their application in real practice is still rare because of their difficult separation from treated water and unfitness for fixed-bed or flow-through treatment systems from their nanoscale feature as other nanoadsorbents. The kinetics study demonstrated that the pseudo second order model could fit the kinetic experimental data better when the adsorbent loading was relatively low, whereas the pseudo first order model could fit the kinetic experimental data better when the adsorbent loading amount was relatively high It could be rolled into cartridges for the use in the fixed-bed water treatment apparatus, which demonstrated a good arsenic removal performance in both lab-prepared and natural water samples with a large arsenic breakthrough bed volume, high regeneration capability, and good stability

Experimental

Results and discussion

Conclusions