Toxic waste sludge derived hierarchical porous adsorbent for efficient phosphate removal

Global effective treatment of phosphorus crisis and toxic waste sludge in one way is urgently needed but still insuffi-cient due to single function, environmental damage, and complicated fabrication process. Herein, we proposed a facile, low-cost, and sustainable strategy to fabricate NiAl layered double oxides/nickel-containing sludge (LDOs/NCS) adsorbent using toxic NCS as raw material via two-step method including hydrothermal process and calcination. The as-designed hierarchical porous adsorbent with large specific surface area and pore volume exhibited excellent adsorption properties towards phosphate. Langmuir adsorption model exhibited the best fit to the experimental data, which illustrated that the adsorption process was dominated by monolayer adsorption. Moreover, even in various double anions systems or in a wide pH range environment (2-12), the as-designed LDOs/NCS still maintained relatively stable adsorption capacity. A possible adsorption mechanism involving surface complexation and electro-static interactions was investigated. Besides, the LDOs/NCS also displayed admirable durability and reusability. Therefore, this waste-control-waste strategy not only simultaneously addresses phosphorus crisis treatment and toxic NCS management, but also could be potentially extended towards rational design of other metals-containing sludge derived functional materials.

Automated summary

This study presents a waste-control-waste strategy to address the phosphorus crisis and toxic sludge management. By utilizing toxic sludge, NiAl layered double oxides/nickel-containing sludge (LDOs/NCS) adsorbent with excellent adsorption properties was fabricated. The adsorbent exhibited stable adsorption capacity in various conditions and a possible adsorption mechanism involving surface complexation and electro-static interactions was proposed. This strategy has the potential to be extended to the rational design of other metals-containing sludge derived functional materials.