Removal Efficiency of some Toxic Heavy Metals from Water by Adsorption by Using Graphite Activated Carbon (GAC)

Abstract

Heavy metals are known to be toxic for living organisms even if they are present at low levels. The presence of heavy metals, organic dyes and microbial pollutants in water continue to be a major concern and the removal of such contaminants is considered to be a major problem in environmental remediation. In the present study, activated graphite was used for removal of some heavy metal ions from aqueous solutions by batch adsorption method. The adsorption efficiency of removal of heavy metal ions by activated graphite was studied and the concentration of some heavy metals namely, Cu, Zn, Pb and Cd was determined using the Atomic Adsorption Spectrophotometer (AAS).The experimental data were calculated and the results revealed that the removal percentage decreased as the concentration of heavy metal increased. Therefore, the increase of solution concentration leads to decrease in the adsorption capacity of heavy metal ions by adsorbent. The results revealed that the activated graphite is an effective adsorbent for removal of zinc, lead, cadmium, and copper ions from aqueous solutions.