Reactive Blue 203 dye Removal Using Biosorbent: A Study of Isotherms, Kinetics, and Thermodynamics

Nowadays, due to increasing usage of dye in various industries and its destructive effects on health and environment, it is necessary to remove dyes from industrial wastes. Although few studies can be found on using pine cone for removal of different dyes, it has not been used yet to remove Reactive Blue 203 (RB203) dye. The purpose of this study is to investigate RB203 dye adsorption using activated carbon produced from pine cone. Optimal values of influencing factors for RB203 dye removal were obtained. The results showed that the maximum removal was occurred at a pH of 2, temperature of 30˚C, dye concentration of 30 mg/L, adsorbent dosage of 100 mg/L, and contact time of 15 min. The maximum removal percentage was 98.48%. In order to study the synthesized activated carbon, some characterization methods including scanning electron microscopy (SEM), Fourier-transform infrared (FT-IR) spectroscopy and Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) have been used. Investigation of adsorption isotherm models revealed that adsorption of RB203dye can be described through D-R and Temkin isotherm models. Additionally, RB203 dye removal follows the pseudo-firstorder kinetic equation.