Some Adsorption Characterizations of the Egyptian Glauconite Ore

Document Type : Original Article

Abstract

MANY industrials use different adsorbent agents in the purification of the liquid products or the wastewater. The use of natural materials as low coast sorbents for the removal of cations, especially heavy metals from aqueous solutions has recently received increasing attention. The present study was conducted to evaluate the some adsorption properties of the Egyptian glauconite ore. Batch equilibrium experiments were conducted using Cu (II), Fe (II) or Ca (II) with glauconite. The results reveal that the thermodynamic equilibrium of Cu (II), Fe (II) or Ca (II) with glauconite is attained at 20 min the curves obtained are single and smooth indicating the formation of a monolayer of cations on the adsorbent surface of glauconite. The pH is one of the most important factors that affect the adsorption process. The maximum removals of Cu (II), Fe (II) or Ca (II) with glauconite are at pH 6, 5.5 and 8, respectively. The process of different cations uptake follows both Langmuir and Freundlich isotherm models and the first-order kinetics. The values of Langmuir constants for glauconite Qmax and b were found to be equal 3.76, 4.61 and 6.32 mg/g and 0.215, 0.046 and 0.062 l/mg, for Cu (II), Fe (II) and Ca (II) respectively. Based on the results of the present study, glauconite can be used as low coast cations adsorbent agent. Especially it has a big advantage that is the sandy loam texturalmakes the glauconite use also as a sand filter.

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