Preparation of activated carbon from doum stone and its application on adsorption of 60Co and 152+154EU: Equilibrium, kinetic and thermodynamic studies

Removal of radionuclides from wastewater before discharging to environment is necessary for the safety of living beings. Activated carbon prepared from doum stone (DS), an agricultural waste by-product, has been used for the sorption of Co-60 and Eu152+154 radionuclides from aqueous solutions. DS has been characterized by different analytical tools. The efficiency of the adsorbent was investigated using batch sorption technique under different experimental conditions. The equilibrium sorption data were analyzed using Freundlich and Langmuir isotherm models. The kinetic experimental data were analyzed using four kinetic models including pseudo-first order, pseudo-second order, Elovich and intraparticle diffusion model to examine the mechanism of sorption and potential rate-controlling step. The maximum capacity of DS was found to be 121 mg/g and 166 mg/g for cobalt and europium, respectively. Sorption efficiency of DS to remove (CO)-C-60, Eu152+154 and Cs-134 from real radioactive wastewater and environmental (river water and sea water) samples was also investigated. The results revealed that the prepared DS as low cost could be used as a promising material for the simultaneous removal of different radionuclides such as Co-60,Eu-152+,Eu-154 and (CS)-C-134, or trivalent actinides such as Am-241,Am-242m,Am-243 from real radioactive waste and environmental water samples. (C) 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.