Tetracycline adsorption onto activated carbons produced by KOH activation of tyre pyrolysis char.

Tyre pyrolysis char (TPC), produced when manufacturing pyrolysis oil from waste tyre, was used as raw material to prepare activated carbons (ACs) by KOH activation. KOH to TPC weight ratios (W) between 0.5 and 6, and activation temperatures from 600 to 800 °C, were used. An increase in W resulted in a more efficient development of surface area, microporosity and mesoporosity. Thus, ACs derived from TPC (TPC-ACs) with specific surface areas up to 814 m(2) g(-1) were obtained. TPC, TPC-ACs and a commercial AC (CAC) were tested for removing Tetracycline (TC) in aqueous phase, and systematic adsorption studies, including equilibrium, kinetics and thermodynamic aspects, were performed. Kinetics was well described by the pseudo-first order model for TPC, and by a pseudo second-order kinetic model for ACs. TC adsorption equilibrium data were also fitted by different isotherm models: Langmuir, Freundlich, Sips, Dubinin-Radushkevich, Dubinin-Astokov, Temkin, Redlich-Peterson, Radke-Prausnitz and Toth. The thermodynamic study confirmed that TC adsorption onto TPC-ACs is a spontaneous process. TC adsorption data obtained in the present study were compared with those reported in the literature, and differences were explained in terms of textural properties and surface functionalities. TPC-ACs had similar performances to those of commercial ACs, and might significantly improve the economic balance of the production of pyrolysis oil from waste tyres.

Activated carbons obtained from sewage sludge by chemical activation: gas-phase environmental applications.

The objective of this study was to evaluate the adsorption capacity for toluene and SO2 of low cost activated carbons prepared from sewage sludge by chemical activation at different impregnation ratios. Samples were characterized by proximate and ultimate analyses, thermogravimetry, infrared spectroscopy and N2 adsorption. Because of the low carbon content of the raw material, the development of porosity in the activated carbons was mainly of a mesoporous nature, with surface areas lower than 300 m(2)/g. The study of gas-phase applications for activated carbons from sewage sludge was carried out using both an organic and an inorganic compound in order to screen for possible applications. Toluene adsorption capacity at saturation was around 280 mg/g, which is a good level of performance given the high ash content of the activated carbons. However, dynamic experiments at low toluene concentration presented diffusion problems resulting from low porosity development. SO2 adsorption capacity is associated with average micropore size, which can be controlled by the impregnation ratio used to prepare the activated carbons.