Production and characterisation of amorphous silica from rice husk waste

Rice covers about 1% of the earth’s surface. Rice husk is the major by-product of the riceprocessing industries which must be appropriately managed. On average 20% of the rice paddy is husk. The major constituents of rice husk are cellulose, lignin and silica. During growth, rice plants absorb silica and other minerals from the soil and accumulate it into their structures. Its composition varies with the diversity, climate and geographic location of growth. The high grade of silica in the husk opens a possibility for its valorisation. Through thermal treatment by calcination, with or without energy recovery, the ash obtained is constituted by amorphous silica with high porosity having potential application as ligand in construction materials, catalyst support, metals adsorbent, insulation or ceramics, among others. In the research developed, the rice husk was processed by washing, acid leaching and calcination in order to produce an ash, which was characterized aiming at assessing possible valorising solutions. The chemical treatment involved water washing for partial purification of the husk, and leaching with diluted sulphuric acid solution, allowing obtaining high metals removal efficiency, decreasing at least 90% of the initial content of contaminants (K, Fe and Mn). After calcination at 540ºC for organics decomposition, the final ash consisted in white colour amorphous silica as confirmed by XRPD analysis, being characterized by SEM to evaluate the microstructure. The results showed that after calcination the rice husk ash had a very porous, alveolar and even tracery morphology, which seems promising for applications requiring high reactivity, such as in construction materials and technical ceramics