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Rice Hull as a Low-Cost Alternative Adsorbent for the Removal of Methylene Blue from Simulated Textile Wastewater in Batch and Rapid Small-Scale Column Test Systems

Author : Geron, Eunice P.
Major Adviser : Guerrero, Gino Apollo M.
Committee Members : Alfafara, Catalino G.; Arocena, Rhebner E.
Year : 2015
Month : December
Type : Thesis
Degree: BS
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Abstract

Rice husk, an agricultural waste, was modified to produce an adsorbent alternative for the removal of Methylene Blue (MB) from aqueous solutions. Chemical modification was done by treating the rice husk with H₃PO₄. This study investigated the effect of pH, contact time, and adsorbent dosage on the adsorption of MB ions unto modified rice husk. It was observed that all of the three factors, including the interaction between the factors contact time and adsorbent dose are the only factors that significantly affects the sorption process. The highest removal efficiency of MB ions, 82.7409% occurred at pH10, adsorbent dose of 10 g/L, and contact time of 120 minutes. Adsorption isotherm experiments were carried out at room temperature and the data obtained from batch studies were fitted with Langmuir, Freundlich, Temkin, Dubinin-Radushkevich, and BET models. Among the five isotherms, the data best fit the Langmuir isotherm with R² value of 0.972. The maximum adsorptive capacity of the sorption system was found out to be 5.3763 mg MB/g rice husk. Using this data, a breakthrough curve was constructed using the RSSCT method. The system reached its breakthrough point after 40 minutes of run time. This can be used as a scale-up factor in further studies.

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