Biosorption of phenol by untreated and treated rice husk

Abstract

The biosorption of phenol on untreated and treated rice husk were studied in batch modes of operation. The chemical pretreatment was applied to the rice husk by using sulfuric acid (H2SO4) and sodium hydroxide (NaOH). The experimental result revealed that biosorption by using untreated rice husk is similar to using treated rice husk. Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) images proved that there are no significant different between the biosorbents. Batch studies were conducted to investigate the effect of various experiment parameters such as biosorbent dosage (4 – 20 g/L), initial phenol concentration (50 – 250 mg/L) and pH (3 – 11). Since the biosorption using different biosorbents shows same result, hence untreated was decided to be optimize using Response Surface Methodology (RSM). The optimum phenol removal was achieved with the optimal condition of 24 g/L of biosorbent dosage, 350 mg/L of phenol solution at reacted in pH 1.5.