Adsorption of CI Basic Blue 3 Dye Molecules from Aqueous Media by Sulfuric Acid-Activated Montmorillonite Mineral

Abstract

Many industries (especially textile, paper, plastic) which use chemicals and colorants, generate considerable amount of waste water since they use excessive amounts of water in their operations. and they These waste waters form a significant reason of worldwide water pollution, and if they are released before being treated, they bring an important harm to these waters.  Therefore, In this paper, adsorption kinetics and equilibrium of CI Basic Blue 3 (BB3) from aqueous media using sulfuric acid-activated montmorillonite mineral (SAM) was investigated. For this aim, firstly the natural montmorillonite mineral (NM) was activated by treating with a 6 M H2SO4 solution for 4 hours at 395 K. After sulfuric acid treatment the SAM samples were characterized using a BET surface analyzer and FTIR spectroscopy. The adsorption experiments in different conditions such as i.e., contact times (0-120 min), initial pH values (2-8), temperatures (298-318 K), and initial dye concentrations (100-350 mg/l) were performed in a thermostatic water bath at an agitation speed of 180 rpm. The experimental maximum adsorption capacity (qe) was determined to be 277 mg/g at 60 min, 6 ± 0.02, 298 K and 350 ppm initial dye concentration. For adsorption of CI Basic Blue 3 (BB3) molecules from aqueous media by the supfuric acid activated montmorillonite mineral (SAM) is determined that Lagergren’s kinetic model (pseudo first order) simulated the kinetic data better than the Ho’s kinetic model (pseudo second order) and the Freundlich isotherm is the best fitting isotherm model equation. Also, the thermodynamic parameters calculated using Van't Hoff equation show that the adsorption process is spontaneous and exothermic. The experimental results of the study indicated that, the acid activated mineral is suitable for adsorption of BB3 dye molecules from aqueous media.