Synthesis, characterization and adsorption studies on activated carbon adsorbent synthesized from Kigelia africana for removal of acid blue 113 dye from synthetic solution

Abstract

The need for waste water treatment, which can be accomplished via adsorbents, is growing today. Adsorbents are inexpensive, environmentally responsible, and made of biodegradable materials that can be replenished. In this work, chemical activation is used to create powdered activated carbon from Kigelia africana. The raw material was chosen because this fruit has not been the subject of any significant research on dye removal. It is also a poisonous fruit, abundantly available in nature, has high cellulose content, carbon rich and possesses less ash content thus making it a low cost activated carbon. After activation, the surface area has increased from 5 m2/g to 400 m2/g, morphology studies with SEM analysis and also analyzed the functional groups with FT-IR. These properties have made our adsorbent highly efficient for dye removal. The batch adsorption studies have been carried out for the removal of acid blue 113 using various combinations of synthetic dye solution concentrations (50–300 mg/L), adsorbent dosage 0.4–7 g/L), contact time (30–300 min), and pH (2–10). The removal % efficiency and capacity (mg/g) are obtained from this work as 99.79 % and 188.89 mg/g, respectively.