Recovery of non-regenerable exhausted resin by hydrothermal chlorination

Abstract

Purpose Cationic resin is widely used in decolouring of textile wastewaters. Tonnes of resin are used in sector, and disposal of resin is being a second waste problem. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the adsorption behaviour of the methylene blue cationic dye from aqueous solution on the cation exchanger Lewatit CNP80 to understand the regenerability of cation exchanger resin from textile wastewaters. Design/methodology/approach Cationic resin was used as an alternative low-cost adsorbent for removing methylene blue dye from textile wastewaters. The adsorption study was carried out in the batch mode. Batch adsorption studies were carried out to examine the effect of parameters such as methylene blue concentration, temperature, pH, resin dose, shaking speed and contact time. Findings It was observed that dye-removal capacity of resin was reached from 17 mgg−1 to 19.4 mgg−1 at 25 °C temperature, pH 5 in 15 min. At the appropriate range of parameters, it was observed that more than 98% removal efficiency was achieved for methylene blue dye, and also, this study was focussed on whether the resin regenerates. In regeneration studies, our purpose was to recover of non-regenerable exhausted cationic resin by NaOCl. Regeneration of Lewatit CNP80 was performed in five cycles. After regeneration, the authors tried to determine whether the adsorption capacity was affected by regeneration. Originality/value In this study, the authors focussed on regeneration studies. The aim is to find easy, low-cost regeneration agent. In conclusion, the authors found that NaOCl is eligible for regeneration studies. The exhausted resin was recovered by NaOCl, and the authors also tested 5th regeneration cycles. Sodium hypochlorite is not a common regeneration agent for adsorption studies. Generally, resin is regenerated by HCl or other regeneration agent products. As a result of that, operational cost was reduced, and the other thing that the authors want to emphasise is textile industry wastewater based high temperature; therefore, this regeneration study can easily work with textile industries.