Extraction and characterization of Silica from bamboo leaves using organic acid leaching treatment

Abstract

Silica is categorized as the valuable inorganic multipurpose chemicals compounds and most abundant material on the earth’s crust. It also can be found in agricultural wastes such as bamboo leaves, rice husk, palm ash, and wheat husk. These wastes can be the renewable source of silica and energy production such as in electronic and ceramics industries. The usage of the strong acids such as sulphuric acid (H₂SO₄), nitric acid (HNO₃) and hydrochloric acid (HCl) in acid leaching treatment for impurities removal and silica extraction are used extensively nowadays but it can be hazardous to environment and not economic. Thus, in this study, the weak acid which is citric acid was used to ensure the safe environment and more economic. FTIR, XRF, and SEM were used for analyzed the data. The morphology of treated bamboo leaves show the tubular porous aggregate due to the presence of alkaline earth metals such as Ca and Mg. These metals possess low density materials which give the porous elements in bamboo leaves. The purity of silica which is 95% was obtained from citric acid leaching treatment bamboo leaves under the optimum conditions with 90⁰C of solution temperature, 30 minutes of reaction time, 3% of citric acid and calcination at 700⁰C for 3 hours.