Biosorption of Fe, Al and Mn of acid drainage from coal mine using brown seaweed sargassum sp. in continuous process

Abstract

The acid mine drainage (AMD) are leaches as result of a coal minning running, it have low pH and high concentrations of heavy metals that convert them in strong polluter; with the purpose of reduce its concentration, a continuous biosorption system was designed by removing heavy metals from drainages using a cheap biosorbent material. The brown seaweed was pre-treatment with solutions 0,1 N of NaOH, Ca(OH)2, NaCl, CaCl2, Na2SO4 y H2SO4 for to study the effect on biosorption process; the removal percentage were determined, which are better than 80% with the exception of pre-treatment with H2SO4 who cancel the algae sorption capacity. The seaweed was packed in plastic mesh and polyester tulle in the shape of a rectangular prism; there isn’t effect on the biosorption process by using this packets. The continuous biosorption process was studied in two units of operation: a packed-bed flow-through sorption column and an horizontal vessel like a canal with baffles, which treated adequately 3,5 and 4,7 l of AMD respectively, using in each one of them 100 g of algae. The burning of algae was studied like an alternative for the problem of handling of residual algae. The ashes kept the metals removed from AMD, furthermore keep stable too by the attack of solutions of different pH.

Keywords

• Acid mine drainage (AMD)
• metal uptake
• Fe
• Mn
• Al
• brown seaweed