Abstract
Chemical contaminants such as heavy metals, dyes, and organic oils seriously affect the environment and threaten human health. About 2 million tons of waste is released every day into the water system. Heavy metals are the largest contributor which cover about 31% of the total composition of water contaminants. Every day, approximately 14 000 people die due to environmental exposure to selected chemicals. Removal of these contaminants down to safe levels is expensive, high energy and unsustainable by current approaches such as oxidation, biodegradation, photocatalysis, precipitation, reverse osmosis and adsorption. A combination of biosorption and nanotechnology offers a new way to remediate these chemical contaminants. Nanostructured materials are proven to have higher adsorption capacities than the same material in its larger-scale form. Nanocellulose is very promising as a high-performance bioadsorbent due to its interesting characteristics of high adsorption capacity, high mechanical strength, hydrophilic surface chemistry, renewability and biodegradability. It has been proven to have higher adsorption capacity and better binding affinity than other similar materials at the macroscale. The high specific surface area and abundance of hydroxyl groups within lead to the possible functionalization of this material for decontamination purposes. Several research papers have shown the effectiveness of nanocellulose in the remediation of chemical contaminants. This review aims to provide an overview of the most recent developments regarding nanocellulose as an adsorbent for chemical contamination remediation. Recent advancements regarding the modification of nanocellulose to enhance its adsorption efficiency towards heavy metals, dyes and organic oils were highlighted. Moreover, the desorption capability and environmental issue related to every developed nanocellulose-based adsorbent were also tackled.
Highlights
The industrial revolution has positively contributed to the growth of the world's economy and towards sociological advancement
7348 | RSC Adv., 2021, 11, 7347–7368. Water rich areas such as rivers and lakes, soil moisture and groundwater in aquifers and the oceans are the locations known to have the highest load of chemical contaminants
- Zeolites - Clays - Silica gel - Activated alumina - Pillared clays - Metal oxides and hydroxides - Membranes - Ion exchange resins - Molecularly imprinted polymers - Activated carbon - Fullerenes - Heterofullerenes - Mesocarbon - Molecular carbon sieves - Carbon nanotubes - Cellulose from various plants - Nanocellulose adsorbents other than nanocellulose towards heavy metal, dye and organic oil removal are shown in Table 3, 4 and 5, respectively
Summary
The industrial revolution has positively contributed to the growth of the world's economy and towards sociological advancement. Ever increasing human activities in concert with the industrial revolution and its consequences have resulted in the occurrence of chemical contamination of the environment in many parts of the world. Thanks to its broad range of possible functionalization, reactivity, processability, biodegradability and reversibility, nanocellulose has emerged as a new class of biobased adsorbent with promising applications in environmental remediation against a large family of contaminants.[3] The functionalization of nanocellulose is key to its success as an adsorbent especially together with its excellent adsorption capacity. The capability of nanocellulose as an adsorbent for heavy metal, chemical dye and organic oil contaminants as has been reported in relevant recent literature shall be looked at. The adsorption capacity of several other available adsorbents shall be used as a comparison
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