Abstract

MODELING FIXED BED COLUMN FOR LEAD (II) REMOVAL FROM AQUEOUS SOLUTION USING NANOCHITOSAN/SODIUM ALGINATE/MICROCRYSTALLINE CELLULOSE BEADS

Vijayalakshmi K. and Sudha P. N.*

Abstract

Fixed-bed column studies were conducted to evaluate the performance of nanochitosan (NCS) /sodium alginate (SA) / microcrystalline cellulose (MC) beads for the removal of divalent lead ions [Pb(II)] from aqueous environments. Various factors such as the effect of flow rate, bed height and initial dye concentration on the adsorption process were investigated. The observed results of percentage removal of lead(II) determined from the breakthrough curves at different flow rates, initial metal ion concentration and bed heights showed that the column demonstrate fairly well performance at the higher bed height, lower influent lead (II) concentration and lower flow rate. The breakthrough time and exhaustion time were found to increase with increasing bed height and it shows a decrease with increasing flow rate and influent lead (II) concentration. Three kinetic models namely Thomas, Yoon Nelson and Adam Bohart model was used to analyze the experimental data and the model parameters were evaluated. The comparison of R2 values reveals that both the Thomas and Yoon–Nelson models were found to have a better fit than the Adams–Bohart model. These results show that NCS/SA/MC bead can be successfully employed for the elimination of Pb(II) from aqueous solution.

Keywords: Column, breakthrough time, exhaustion time, Lead (II), Kinetic models.