A theoretical model for liquid-solid chemisorption of pollutants on the surfaces of non-porous adsorbents

Abstract EN

A double-exponent model describing liquid-solid chemisorption kinetics is derived based on active sites theory (AST).

The model has the advantage of expressing adsorption rate as an explicit function of adsorbate initial concentration, adsorbent dose in addition to equilibrium uptake and contact time thus facilitating investigations of the effect of these parameters on process kinetics.

The model was applied to sets of experimental data obtained on chemisorption of Pb ions by zeolite tuff and was shown to fit these data quite well with 0.920 - 0.992 as correlation coefficient.

AST model provides data representation similar to that of pseudo- second order and Elovitch chemisorption models.

However, the pseudo- first order model was not representative of the experimental data.

The study showed that increasing adsorbent dose will boost the mass transfer coefficient and consequently the rate of chemisorption.