Waste Musa acuminata residue as a potential biosorbent for the removal of hexavalent chromium from synthetic wastewater

Abstract

The present study is undertaken to evaluate the feasibility use of Musa acuminata bract as (MAB) biosorbent towards the removal of hexavalent chromium from synthetic wastewater. Chromium is a potential pollutant to all forms of life and therefore efficient way of treatment is necessary even towards lower chromium concentration removal. The objectives of the present research include optimizing parameters influencing biosorption of hexavalent chromium, pH, dosage of the MAB, influent Cr(VI) concentration, and time. The MAB was characterized using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscope (SEM) analysis, to examine the surface functional group and structural assessments of the MAB. Optimum pH for the effective biosorption was found to be 2.0, and the biosorption capacity was found to be 36.84 mg/g with 87.55% of Cr(VI) removal. Further experiments were carried out at the optimized pH for other parameters influence on the Cr(VI) biosorption. Langmuir isotherm shows better fit than the rest of the models because of the higher R2 value. The data were analyzed using pseudo-first-order, pseudo-second-order, intra-particle diffusion, and Elovich models. Higher degree of coefficient of determination was obtained for the pseudo-second-order kinetic model. The results of the present study suggested that MAB could be used beneficially in treating industrial effluents containing hexavalent chromium through further research study of column biosorption.