Poly (methyl methacrylate) grafted wheat straw for economical and eco-friendly treatment of oily wastewater

Abstract

The sustainable development of oil–gas and petrochemical industries necessitates the development of cost-effective and eco-friendly technologies to treat mass-produced oily wastewater discharge from these industries. This study applied a simple radical polymerization to enhance the oil adsorption efficiency of agricultural waste biomass wheat straw (WS) by grafting biocompatible poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA). Diesel oil adsorption from oil-in-water emulsion using the PMMA grafted WS was thoroughly studied for the first time in the quest of developing an economical and eco-friendly adsorbent for the adsorptive treatment of oily wastewater. The success of pre-treatment of pristine WS and the subsequent PMMA grafting were evaluated by SEM morphology, BET analysis, EDX and XPS elemental analysis, FTIR, and contact angle measurements. SEM images indicated that the inner interconnected tubular pore channels of WS are exposed significantly upon alkaline hydrogen peroxide pre-treatment. PMMA grafting substantially improved oil adhesivity, as evident from the 0° oil contact angle for WS-g-PMMA film. Oil absorptivity was thoroughly evaluated by batch oil adsorption study using variable adsorbent dosages and oil emulsion concentrations. The WS-g-PMMA exhibited explicitly higher adsorption capacity (ca. 1129 mg/g) compared to that of the pristine (ca. 346 mg/g) and pretreated (ca. 741 mg/g) due to high accessibility to exposed inner interconnected tubular pore channels and strong hydrophobic interactions between the WS-g-PMMA surface and oil droplets. Langmuir and Freundlich adsorption isotherms were applied to evaluate the adsorption mechanism. The experimental data fit well with the Freundlich isotherm, clearly indicating the heterogeneity of adsorption sites, as well as multilayer adsorption of oil. The experimental adsorption data fit well with the pseudo-second-order rate equation with R2 as high as 0.999, which confirmed the multilayer adsorption of oil. The high oil adsorption capacity of the WS-g-PMMA makes it a very promising material for oily wastewater treatment. The oil removal efficiency declined by < 4% at the end of 3 adsorption-regeneration cycles, indicating the possibility for long-term usage, which is beneficial for cost-effectiveness and lower frequency for end-use waste management. This will simultaneously resolve issues with the treatment of oily wastewater and facilitate the recycling of abundant quantities of waste WS. This study serves as a reference for analyzing the suitability of wheat straw for treating extremely challenging waste streams, such as steam assisted gravity drainage (SAGD) produced water containing BTEX and PAHs that are also hydrophobic like diesel oil.