Activated carbon/bentonite/Fe₃O₄ nanocomposite for treatment of wastewater containing Reactive Red 198

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this study was the synthesis of activated carbon/bentonite/Fe₃O₄ nanocomposite for the elimination of Reactive Red 198 (RR198) anionic dye from aqueous media. The physical properties of the nanocomposite were investigated using BET, EDX, Map, SEM, FTIR, VSM, XRD, and DLS analyses. DLS analysis showed that the size of the aforementioned nanocomposite was 70.7 nm. VSM analysis showed that the nanocomposite has a ferromagnetic property. BET analysis indicated that the nanocomposite has a mesoporous structure. The results showed that the highest removal efficiency of MV dye (94.87%) was obtained at pH 8, contact time of 50 min, temperature of 25°C, initial dye concentration of 5 mg/L, and composite dosage of 2 g/L, which indicated a significant sorption efficiency. Also, the equilibrium and kinetic studies showed that the Langmuir isotherm model and the pseudo-second-order kinetic model could better describe the sorption process of RR198 by the activated carbon/bentonite/Fe₃O₄ nanocomposite than other models. Besides, the thermodynamic study indicated that the sorption process was exothermic.

KEYWORDS:

• Sorption process
• Reactive Red 198
• activated carbon/bentonite/Fe₃O₄ nanocomposite
• aqueous media

In this research, bentonite/activated carbon/Fe₃O₄ nanocomposite was synthesized to remove Reactive Red 198 anionic dye from aqueous media, which has not been studied in previous studies. To do this, its characteristics has been thoroughly investigated using different analyses such as BET, EDX/Map, SEM, FTIR, VSM, XRD, and DLS. Also, this nano-adsorbent showed high adsorption efficiency (94.87%), which was a significant value. EDX analysis after the sorption process showed that the dye has been properly adsorbed on the adsorbent surface. Therefore, the results showed that the aforementioned nanocomposite was a significant adsorbent for removing Reactive red 198 dye from aqueous media.