Separation of Levulinic Acid Using Polymeric Resin, Amberlite IRA-67

The adsorptive separation of levulinic acid (LA) from its aqueous solution was studied by using a commercial adsorbent and weakly basic anion exchange resin, Amberlite IRA-67 (IRA-67). The data were generated for equilibrium and kinetic studies, and to analyze the performance of IRA-67 on the removal efficiency. The equilibrium study was performed to see the effect of adsorbent quantity (0.25-1.5 g) and initial LA concentrations (2-4 g.L-1) at three different temperatures (298, 308, and 318 K). To determine the kinetics of adsorption process, concentration profile was achieved up to a time of 90 min at 298 K. It was observed that both the intake capacity (32-64 mg.g(-1)) and removal efficiency (6.75-72.5%) of IRA-67 were increased with an increase in the quantity of adsorbent (0.25-1.5 g) at 298 K. From the kinetics of adsorption, 50 min was considered as an equilibrium time. Different isotherm and kinetic models were used to determine the equilibrium and kinetic parameters of LA adsorption process. From the temperature study (298, 308, and 318 K), the thermodynamic properties were also estimated at three different LA concentrations.