Acid red G dye removal from aqueous solutions by porous ceramsite produced from solid wastes: Batch and fixed-bed studies

Abstract

A novel porous ceramsite was made of municipal sludge, coal fly ash, and river sediment by sintering process, and the performance of batch and fixed-bed column systems containing this material in the removal of acid red G (ARG) dye from aqueous solutions was assessed in this study. The results of orthogonal test showed that sintering temperature was the most important determinant in the preparation of porous ceramsite, and it possesses developed pore structure and high specific surface area. Batch experiment results indicated that the adsorption process of ARG dye toward porous ceramsite was a spontaneous exothermic reaction, which could be better described with Freundlich–Langmuir isotherm model (R2 > 0.992) and basically followed the pseudo-first-order kinetic equation (R2 > 0.993). Column experiment results showed that when the porous ceramsite was used as packing material, its adsorption capacity was roughly improved by 3.5 times compared with that in batch system, and the breakthrough behavior was simulated well with Yoon–Nelson model, with R2 > 0.954. This study suggested that the novelty man-made porous ceramsite obtained from solid wastes might be processed as a certain cost-effective treatment material fit for the dye removal in aqueous solutions.

Keywords

• porous ceramsite
• dye wastewater
• adsorption process
• breakthrough performance
• kinetic analysis