High Efficient Removal of Phosphate in Aqueous Solution by Eco-friendly Materials

The efficiency of phosphate removal in aqueous solution by CaO, Ca(OH)2 and CaCO3 has been studied in this work. Batch of experiments conducted with the initial phosphate concentrations from 5 to 1000 ppm have shown that CaCO3 could be applied for phosphate removal at low concentration with the maximum phosphate removal capacity at 4.0 mg/g. In contrast, the highest phosphate removal capacity of CaO and Ca(OH)2 was 287.36 mg/g and 235.21 mg/g at initial concentration of 500 ppm, and phosphate removal rate was 85% and 97% at initial concentration of 5 ppm. Crystalline hydroxylapatite was detected in the precipitate by XRD analysis. The molar ratio of P in the precipitate and Ca in the materials (CaO and Ca(OH)2) was 0.52 and 0.56 at initial concentration of 500 ppm, compared to P/Ca molar ratio of 0.6 in hydroxylapatite. Moreover, hydroxylapatite is the main component of fertilizer that can be applied for agriculture