Preparation, Characterization and Adsorption Evaluation of old Newspaper Fibres using Basket Reactor (Nickel Removal by Adsorption)

In this work, old newspaper fibers (ONF) bleached with H2O2, treated with KOH and treated with NaOCl were investigated as potential adsorbents. The characterization of the produced fibers using FTIR, SEM and particle size distribution have been carried out and tested for the removal of Ni (II) from aqueous solutions. The results indicated that the fibers treated with KOH give the highest %removal of Ni (II) with 88%. Two different reactor designs (batch and basket reactor) with different variables were studied. The results indicated that the equilibrium time was 30 min. and the removal of Ni (II) increased significantly as the pH increased from 2.0 to 6.0 and decreased at pH range of 6.5–8.0. The adsorption of Ni (II) onto ONF treated with KOH using batch and basket reactors follows the Langmuir isotherm. The pseudo second order kinetic model provided good correlation for the adsorption of Ni (II) onto ONF treated with KOH for both batch and basket reactors.