Adsorption of Phenol and Resorcinol on Parthenium Based Activated Carbon (Pac) in Basal Salt Medium: Equilibrium and Kinetics

The adsorption studies were carried out for the removal of Phenol and Resorcinol on Parthenium Based Activated Carbon (PAC) at 301 K and neutral pH ~7. To determine the adsorption equilibrium isotherms, the experiments were performed at the initial concentration of adsorbates with adsorbent doses from 1 g/l to 10 g/l. The experimental data were fitted to six isothermal models, and a nonlinear least square method has been used to estimate model parameters. It has been observed that for adsorption on PAC, Freundlich model was best fitted for the study and data was more closely related for the removal of both the pollutants from industrial wastewater. In this study, the adsorption kinetics were also studied in three distinct phases-rapid, medium & amp: slow for the time period till 12 hours. The parameter values found in this study shall be useful in designing and activated carbon adsorber for treatment of industrial wastewater at large scale. The present work shows that Parthenium based activated carbon (PAC) was an effective method for the adsorption of phenol and resorcinol and p-cresol from aqueous solution. The adsorption of phenol and its derivatives are in the following order: Phenol is adsorbed in maximum amount Resorcinol is comparatively adsorbed lesser than phenol.