It is of great interest and importance to resource utilization of waste biomass to produce porous carbon for environmental treatments. Pore structure and properties of the obtained carbon mainly relate to carbonization conditions and biomass types. In this work, a series of porous, biomass-activated carbons (AC) were prepared using shaddock peel, with ZnCl2 as a pore-forming agent. The effect of carbonization temperature and the mass ratio between ZnCl2 and shaddock peel were thoroughly investigated. The material composition, surface chemical properties, and surface structures of samples were carefully characterized. The specific surface area and adsorption capacity to methylene blue (MB) of adsorbents were changed with the carbonization temperature and the mass ratios between ZnCl2 and shaddock peel; when the temperature was at 1000 °C and the mass ratio was equal to 2:1, the resulting adsorbent had the largest specific surface area of 2398.74 m2/g and average pore size of 3.04 nm, which showed the highest adsorption capacity to MB to be 869.57 mg/g. The adsorption processes of biomass AC adsorbent matched the pseudo-second-order kinetic model and Langmuir isotherm model. This efficient and environmentally friendly biomass AC adsorbent from shaddock peel, activated by ZnCl2, is a promising candidate for the treatment of water pollution.
