Powdered activated carbon prepared from Leucaena leucocephala biomass for cadmium removal in water purification process

Abstract EN

Activated carbons (ACs) were prepared from Leucaena leucocephala biomass.

This is an agri- cultural solid waste by-product, as well as easily grown species available abundantly in Southeast Asia.

In this work, activated carbon derived from Leucaena leucocephala biomass was prepared for sequestration of cadmium from aqueous solutions.

The activated carbon was produced by a NaOH chemical activation process using NaOHchar ratios (w/w) of 1:1, 2:1 and 3:1 at 800*C.

The activated carbon's BET surface areas were determined as 185, 595, and 776m2 g-1 for the NaOH:char ratios of 1:1, 2:1, and 3:1, respectively.

At initial concen- tration of 30mg/l, maximum cadmium adsorption was achieved within 40min.

The adsorb- ent also showed good sorption of cadmium at pH 7.0 with solution temperature of 30°C.

Isothermic studies showed the adsorption process best fitted to Langmuir isotherm which indicates monolayer adsorption had happened while kinetic studies showed physisorption process was favorable, determined by pseudo-first order kinetic model.

Maximum adsorption capacity was found to be 70.423 mg/g for NaOH:char ratios of 3:1.