Potential use of cotton plant wastes for the removal of Remazol Black B reactive dye

Abstract

In this study, the potential use of cotton plant wastes – stalk (CS) and hull (CH) – as sorbents for the removal of Remazol Black B (RB5), a vinyl sulfone type reactive dye, was investigated. The results indicated that adsorption was strongly pH-dependent but slightly temperature-dependent for each sorbent-dye system. The Freundlich, Langmuir, Redlich–Peterson and Langmuir–Freundlich adsorption models were used for the mathematical description of adsorption equilibrium and isotherm constants were evaluated at 25 °C. All models except the Freundlich model were applicable for the description of dye adsorption by both sorbents in the concentration range studied. According to the Langmuir model, CS and CH sorbents exhibited the highest RB5 dye uptake capacities of 35.7 and 50.9 mg g −1, respectively, at an initial pH value of 1.0. Simple mass transfer and kinetic models were applied to the experimental data to examine the mechanisms of adsorption and potential rate-controlling steps. It was found that both external mass transfer and intra-particle diffusion played an important role in the adsorption mechanisms of dye, and adsorption kinetics followed the pseudo second-order type kinetic model for each sorbent. Using the Langmuir model parameters, thermodynamic constant Δ G° was also evaluated for each sorption system.