Studies on Effectiveness of Low Cost Adsorbents in Continuous Column for Textile Effluents

Abstract

Textile industries consume large volume of water and chemicals for wet processing of textiles. In the present study, Cotton Shell and Neem Bark were used as a low cost adsorbent. For the Reactive dyes an adsorption studies in a batch process was carried out with different variables like pH, the adsorbate concentrations, contact time, amount of adsorbent and temperature of the environment. Equilibrium sorption isotherms and kinetics were investigated. The experimental data were analyzed by, Freundlich and Langmuir model of adsorption. The adsorption isotherm data were fitted well to Freundlich and Langmuir isotherm, monolayer adsorption capacity was found. In continuous fixed bed column studies on adsorption, the effects of bed height, feed flow rate, and inlet concentration were studied by assessing breakthrough curve. The column data were fitted by the Thomas, clark and modified dose response models. The modified dose response model was best fit to the breakthrough curves at experimental conditions. Experimental results obtained were analyzed and optimized using surface method of the Box-Behnken design.