Treatment of real industrial wastewater with high sulfate concentrations using modified Jordanian kaolin sorbent: batch and modelling studies

Banan Hudaib

doi:10.1016/j.heliyon.2021.e08351

Treatment of real industrial wastewater with high sulfate concentrations using modified Jordanian kaolin sorbent: batch and modelling studies

Heliyon. 2021 Nov 9;7(11):e08351. doi: 10.1016/j.heliyon.2021.e08351. eCollection 2021 Nov.

Author

Banan Hudaib¹

Affiliation

¹ Chemical Engineering Department, Faculty of Engineering Technology, Al-Balqa Applied University, Amman 11134, Jordan.

Abstract

In the present study, BaCl₂ modified Jordanian kaolin sorbent (obtained from Mahis, Jordan) was used to remove sulfate-contaminated industrial wastewater. The kaolin sample was pretreated to enhance its adsorption capacity and then characterized using X-Ray fluorescence (XRF) and Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR). Equilibrium isotherms for the adsorption parameters were carried out experimentally, and the adsorption data correlated very well with Freundlich and Temkin and Dubinin-Radushkevich models. Furthermore, the adsorption kinetics followed the pseudo-first-order and intraparticle diffusion models perfectly. The estimated value of the maximum adsorption capacity $q_{m}$ = 85.08 mg/g indicates that kaolin has a very high capacity to adsorb sulfate ions at studied parameters. The estimated value of the mean free energy (4.87 kJ/mol) is very low, confirming physical type adsorption. The study results established that modified Jordanian kaolin could serve as a safe and effective natural adsorbent for sulfate-contaminated industrial wastewater.

Keywords: Batch; Equilibrium; Kaolin; Kinetics; Sulfate ions; Wastewater.