Treatment of Textile Wastes

Activated carbons were prepared from the agricultural solid wastes, silk cotton hull, coconut tree sawdust, sago waste, maize cob and banana pith and used to eliminate heavy metals and dyes from aqueous solution. Adsorption of all dyes and metal ions required a very short time and gave quantitative removal. Experimental results show all carbons were effective for the removal of pollutants from water. Since all agricultural solid wastes used in this investigation are freely, abundantly and locally available, the resulting carbons are expected to be economically viable for wastewater treatment.

Modified peat was prepared by mixing thoroughly raw peat with sulfuric acid, and modified peat-resin particle was obtained, by mixing modified peat with solutions of polyvinylalcohol (PVA) and formaldehyde. In this paper, the adsorption of Basic Magenta and Basic Brilliant Green onto modified peat-resin particle is examined. The adsorption isotherm showed that the adsorption of basic dyes on modified peat-resin particle deviated from the Langmuir and Freundlich equations. The pseudo-first order, pseudo-second order and intraparticle diffusion models were used to fit the experimental data. By comparing the standard deviation, it was found that the intraparticle diffusion model could be used to well describe the adsorption of two basic dyes on modified peat-resin particle. According to the change of intraparticle diffusion parameter, the adsorption processes could be divided into different stages. The kinetics experiment also indicated that initial dye concentrations, particle dose and particle size could affect the adsorption processes of basic dyes. Copyright 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd.