IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v13y2021i21p11716-d663162.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Synthesis, Characterization and Application of Carbon Nanotubes Decorated with Zinc Oxide Nanoparticles for Removal of Benzene, Toluene and p-Xylene from Aqueous Solution

Author

Listed:
  • Basim Ahmed Abussaud

    (Department of Chemical Engineering, King Fahd University of Petroluim and Minerals, Dhahran 31261, Saudi Arabia)

Abstract

The removal of benzene, toluene and p-xylene (BTX) from water is necessary to avoid various health and environmental concerns. Among various techniques, adsorption is suitable and widely used for the removal of BTX from water. In this study, the adsorption of BTX from water was performed using carbon nanotubes that were impregnated with zinc oxide nanoparticles. The impregnation was performed using the wet impregnation technique. The synthesized materials were characterized using scanning electron microscopy (SEM), energy dispersive X-ray (EDX), X-ray diffraction (XRD) spectroscopy, thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) and nitrogen adsorption–desorption analysis. In batch adsorption experiments, the effect of adsorbent dosage, initial concentration, and contact time were investigated. The percentage removal for a given time and dosage was in the order of p-xylene > toluene > benzene. The kinetics models’ fitting revealed that the pseudo-second-order model fits well the adsorption of benzene, toluene and p-xylene with R 2 > 99.4%. The results of adsorption isotherm fitting revealed the best fit with Sips isotherm model (R 2 > 99.7%) and the adsorption capacity was p-xylene: 125 mg/g > toluene: 105 mg/g > benzene: 70 mg/g. This behavior is observed probably due to a decrease in solubility and an increase in the molecular weight of BTX.

Suggested Citation

  • Basim Ahmed Abussaud, 2021. "Synthesis, Characterization and Application of Carbon Nanotubes Decorated with Zinc Oxide Nanoparticles for Removal of Benzene, Toluene and p-Xylene from Aqueous Solution," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(21), pages 1-11, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:13:y:2021:i:21:p:11716-:d:663162
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/21/11716/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/21/11716/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:13:y:2021:i:21:p:11716-:d:663162. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.