Preparation and characterization of activated carbon from wood waste for metals removal

ThIS study was carried out to determlne the effectiveness of activated carbon from wood waste as low cost adsorbent to remove heavy metals namely Cadmium (II), Chromium (Ill), and Lead (TI) from aqueous solutions. Batch experiment was used to investigate the optimum condition for the adsorbent to remove these heavy metals. Two parameters namely pH and initial concentration of adsorbate ions were studied. The activated carbon was prepared using wood waste char from microwave pyrolysis and followed by chemical activation using KOH. Adsorption for Pb, Cd and Cr was found to be highly pH dependent. The percentage of removal increased with an increase in pH from 2 to 10. Obtained resul!s give an adsorption capacity ofPb (97.30 %) at pH 4, Cd (93.71 %) al pH 6 and Cr (97.33 %) at pH 6, exposure lime of 2 h al 25"C wilh 0.1 g adsorbent. This study showed data for adsorption equilibrium fitled better in Freundlich isotherm model than Langmuir isotherm model which the value of R' was 0.8930, 0.9800 and 0.8870 for Pb, Cd and Cr respectively. The findings from this study have demonstrated the potential of wood waste as an alternative adsorbent for heavy metal remediation jn wastewater