Characterization of a cetyltrimethyl ammonium bromide-modified sorbent for removal of perfluorooctane sulphonate from water

Abstract

This study was carried out to develop a cost-effective and practicable sorbent for application in abrupt perfluorooctane sulphonate (PFOS) pollution accidents. The main merit of this work was that a waste material, namely construction and demolition (C&D) waste, was employed as a raw base material for the sorbent synthesis. The waste material underwent alkaline fusion-hydrothermal synthesis and a cationic surfactant cetyltrimethyl ammonium bromide (CTAB) modification process to form a CTAB-modified sorbent (CMCDSS). Experimental results showed that PFOS concentrations and solution pH had significant effect on the PFOS sorption on construction and demolition waste synthesized sorbent (CDSS) and CMCDSS (using 0.2CMCDSS as representative). PFOS could be effectively and rapidly adsorbed on CMCDSS, and sorption equilibrium was achieved within 2.5 h. The sorption amounts of PFOS on CMCDSSs enhanced along with the increase in CTAB loading amounts. Moreover, the CMCDSS can be applied effectively under acidic condition at pH 2–6 and various removal mechanisms were clarified at different sorption conditions. Accordingly, this work developed a novel and applicable material for dealing with abrupt environmental PFOS contamination accidents.

Keywords:

• PFOS sorption
• construction and demolition waste
• fusion-hydrothermal synthesis
• CTAB-modified sorbent
• hydrophobic partition

Acknowledgements

The authors are also grateful to Ms Qin Zhou, Dr Tiliang Zhang and Mr Zhiyong Yu for assisting them with the UPLC/MS/MS analysis.

Funding

This work was supported by the Environmental Public Welfare Project [grant number 201009026], the National Water Pollution Control and Management Program [grant number 2012ZX07202-005] and the National Natural Science Foundation of China [grant number 21077120, 51278485].