Phenol Adsorption in Water by Granular Activated Carbon from Coconut Shell
Corresponding email: renitk@bunghatta.ac.id
Published at : 16 Dec 2019
Volume : IJtech
Vol 10, No 8 (2019)
DOI : https://doi.org/10.14716/ijtech.v10i8.3463
Desmiarti, R., Martynis, M., Trianda, Y., Li, F., Viqri, A., Yamada, T., 2019. Phenol Adsorption in Water by Granular Activated Carbon from Coconut Shell. International Journal of Technology. Volume 10(8), pp. 1488-1497
| Reni Desmiarti | Departement of Chemical Engineering Department, Faculty of Industrial Technology, Bung Hatta University, Padang 25147, Indonesia |
| Munas Martynis | Departement of Chemical Engineering Department, Faculty of Industrial Technology, Bung Hatta University, Padang 25147, Indonesia |
| Yenni Trianda | Departement of Chemical Engineering Department, Faculty of Industrial Technology, Bung Hatta University, Padang 25147, Indonesia |
| Fusheng Li | River Basin Research Center, Gifu University, 1-1 Yanagido, Gifu 501-1193, Japan |
| Ahmad Viqri | Departement of Chemical Engineering Department, Faculty of Industrial Technology, Bung Hatta University, Padang 25147, Indonesia |
| Toshiro Yamada | Department of Civil Engineering Department, Faculty of Engineering, Gifu University, 1-1 Yanagido, Gifu 501-1193, Japan |
Phenol adsorption by granular activated
carbon from coconut shell was studied in batch experiments under various
initial phenol concentrations. Adsorption equilibrium was reached within 4
hours. The characteristics of the phenol adsorption process onto granular
activated carbon from coconut shell were studied by adsorption isotherm
modeling, analysis that uses fluorescence spectroscopy, in addition to measuring
nanoparticle size and volume distribution by a Zetasizer Nano. The Langmuir
isotherm model best fits the phenol adsorption onto granular activated carbon
from coconut shell, and the maximum adsorption capacities for unsterilized and
sterilized types were found to be 17.54 mg/g and 13.70 mg/g, respectively. The excitation-emission
matrix results showed that the humic-like substance’s peaks almost completely
disappear post-adsorption. It was also found that the nanoparticle size
distribution shifted from ranges of 0.72–1.74 nm in raw water to 45.66–726.73
nm and 57.08–1068.47 nm post-adsorption in unsterilized and sterilized water
samples, respectively, suggesting that phenol adsorption had occurred. This
study shows that low-cost coconut shell–based activated
carbon demonstrated good removal capability and hence can be used as a new
adsorbent material on large scale.
Adsorption; Coconut shell; EEMs; Nanoparticle; Phenol
Phenolic compounds have high toxic
materials in various aquatic environments. Phenols are widely used as raw materials in the manufacturing of a variety of industrial
products, such as coal processing, paint, pesticides, and pharmaceuticals
(Ocampo-Perez et al., 2011). They are considered
one of the priority pollutants in wastewater because they are harmful to
organisms, even at low concentrations (Petrie et al., 2015; Sophia & Lima,
2018). Because of phenolic compounds’ toxicities, the United States
Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA) and the European Union have targeted
phenolic compounds as important micro pollutants in water environments.
The limit of phenol is 0.1 mg l-1 in the effluent of
wastewater treatment plants to defend against negative human health effects (Balasubramanian
& Venkatesan, 2012). The limit of phenol concentration in drinking water is
0.001 mg l-1 as regulated by the World Health Organization
In Indonesia, especially in Padang city, water
bodies also have been polluted by phenols. Research conducted by the Regional
Environmental Impact Management Agency in 2011 showed that phenol levels in
Kuranji River were 1 mg l-1, exceeding the 0.001 ppm of phenol
limit. In 2013, the phenol level had reached 2.74 mg l-1, an
increase of 63.5% from the previous investigation (Desmiarti et al., 2016).
Therefore, the removal of phenols is a major necessity for water environmental
safety.
Adsorption using activated
carbon is a well-established process to remove organic pollutants, such as
phenol, from water and wastewater due to its excellent adsorption abilities.
Granular activated carbons are generally used due to their abilities to adsorb both
organic and inorganic contaminants, especially phenolic compounds (Kowalczyk et al., 2018), nickel ions (Olufemi
& Eniodunmo, 2018), lanthanide ions (Kusrini et al., 2018), and adsorbed natural gas (Alhamid et al.,
2015). Activated carbon has a large surface area, micropore structure, and high
adsorption capacity, rendering it an excellent adsorbent.
The adsorption of phenolic
compounds from aquatic environments on activated carbons has been studied for a
long period. Other adsorbents have been used, such as organoclays (Luo et al.,
2015) and organomontmorillonites (Wang et al., 2017). However, some of these
adsorbents could not remove all the phenol from water samples. Activated carbon,
which is both lower-cost and more locally available, should be compared with
other adsorbents to determine its relative performance.
In this study, granular
activated carbon from coconut shell is used as an adsorbent to eliminate phenols
from aqueous solutions that occur in the western coastal side of Padang city,
Indonesia. Activated carbon was expected to be a cost-effective adsorbent. The
objective of this study was to investigate the feasibility of activated carbon
prepared from the coconut shell, an agricultural waste material, for the
removal of phenol from aqueous solutions. Three types of commercial granular
activated carbon were used as comparisons in this study.
Granular activated carbon from coconut shell was used to
investigate the phenol-adsorption capacities of various adsorbents in batch
experiments. The equilibrium adsorption data was best characterized by the
Langmuir isotherm, indicating monolayer adsorption on a homogenous surface. The
adsorption capacities in both US and S type was found to be 17.54 mg/g and
13.70 mg/g, respectively, at 25°C. The fluorescence spectroscopy results showed
the Kuranji River DOM contained two major components: humic-like substances and
protein-like substances. The maximum removal rate of 92.5% for both types of
samples was obtained post-adsorption, as measured by the phenol kit. The
nanoparticle size distribution also shifted from ranges of 0.72–1.74 nm in raw
water to 45.66–726.73 nm and 57.08–1068.47 nm in US type and S type water,
respectively. These results showed that this agricultural waste material could
be used as an excellent adsorbent.
We are grateful to the Ministry of Research, Technology and Higher Education, Republic of Indonesia, who supported this work with research contract K10/KM/2018. The authors are also thankful to the Water Quality Laboratory and the River Basin Research Center, Gifu University, Japan
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