Date pits waste as a solid phase extraction sorbent for the analysis of lead in wastewater and for use in manufacturing brick: An eco-friendly waste management approach

Lead (Pb(II)), an extremely hazardous heavy metal that has been shown to have detri-mental effects on both the environment and humans, mostly gets into the ecosystem through indus-trial activities. In this work, a new solid-phase extraction (SPE) based on treated date pits bio-sorbent and iCAP Q inductively-coupled plasma mass spectrometry (iCAP Q ICP/MS) method has been optimized for the trace determination of Pb(II) in various industrial wastewater effluents. A cost-effective biomass material was prepared from date pits (DP), and chemically modified with H2O2 and successively used as SPE bio-sorbent for Pb(II) extraction. Extracting solutions for instance H2SO4, HNO3 and HCl at various concentrations (1-5 mM) were optimized, and best extraction of Pb(II) was obtained by HCl (1 mM). The optimized SPE and iCAP Q ICP/MS method has offered excellent validation conditions in terms of coefficient of determination (CoD, R2 > 0.999), detection limit (DL, 0.011 mu g/L), quantification limit (QL, 0.034 mu g/L), and run-to -run and day-to-day precision (RSD < 6 %). The optimized procedure was practically applied in the determination of Pb(II) in industrial wastewater comprising iron and steel, textile, printing and battery industries. Among the analyzed samples, the battery industry produced higher amounts of Pb(II) (18.55 mu g/L) followed by iron and steel (14.65 mu g/L), petroleum (12.38 mu g/L) printing (5.78 mu g/L) and textile (3.76 mu g/L) industries. The recovery values were achieved between 95 % and 99 %. The obtained results have established the appropriateness of the offered technique as a new useful method for the routine examination of Pb(II) in industrial wastes. In addition, the cur-rent method could be expansively used in the proficient removal and identification of other heavymetals contaminants from similar matrices. Further, the metal ions saturated bio-sorbents were used in the preparations of bricks and it was found to be a successful approach for heavy metals and agricultural waste management.(c) 2022 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of King Saud University.

Automated summary

In this study, a cost-effective method using treated date pits as a bio-sorbent was optimized for the determination of trace Pb(II) in industrial wastewater. The method showed excellent validation conditions and was successfully applied for the analysis of Pb(II) in various industrial waste samples.