A comparative study on the adsorption efficiency of activated carbon and iron doped activated carbon prepared from alstonia scholaris for the removal of textile dyes

Abstract

The main intention of the work is to reveal the treatment of synthetic dye effluents using the nearby accessible agricultural waste, an attempt for eco-friendly adsorbents. Among the various choices of agricultural wastes, Alstonia Scholaris wood waste is found to be noticeably higher in carbon content. Among the various synthetic dyes such as direct dye, acidic blue, basic dye etc., released from dyeing industries, Methylene blue (MB) and Reactive red (RR2) are selected, as they are unavoidable and the most preferred choice of textile dyes for their consistent performance in dyeing industry. Their unreacted dye formulations and untreated effluent cause great challenges to the aquatic and terrestrial life forms. Their treatment using no cost natural wood waste has been dealt in this study. The hand-picked, washed and sun-dried precursor material was chemically activated using concentrated sulphuric acid and then high temperature activation was preceded using muffle furnace at gt 500 °C to synthesize Alstonia Scholaris Activated Carbon (ASAC). The improvisation of the high temperature activated carbon was considered as a most needed and futuristic process in waste water treatment. Hence, improvisation of ASAC was attributed to co precipitation method at room temperature, and the iron oxide doped Alstonia Scholaris activated carbon (ASFe) was made using appropriate amount of hydroxy ferrous sulphate, ferrous ammonium sulphate and sodium hydroxide solutions. Various structural and characterisation test results make sure the addition of precipitated iron oxide nanoparticles onto the surface of ASAC newline