Removal of Acid Textile Dye from the Aqueous Solution by a New Adsorbent Obtained from Waste Cotton from the Garment Plant

The paper investigates the possibility of removing acid dye from the aqueous solution by an adsorption process on new adsorbent prepared from waste cotton textile from the ready-made garment industry. It is a waste generated during the cutting of the layers of cotton knitwear, which is practically the product from the textile cutting process. The obtained adsorbent is a bulk material with heterogeneous porous particles, of ragged shapes. In particle interiors, there are pronounced cracks, cavities and channels that form the basis of microporous material. The qualitative and quantitative characterization of the obtained adsorbent shows that this is a relatively porous material where the carbon is dominant in the chemical composition. The results of textural properties of new adsorbent from cotton knitwear waste show different parameters which with their numerous values characterize the specific surface area, pore volume or pore diameter. It can be said that the obtained new adsorbent has micropores and small mesopores, which produce a high specific surface area. During adsorption, the longer contact time causes a greater amount of dye on the adsorbent, i.e. with the duration of the adsorption process the dye concentration in the solution decreases. A number of isotherms of two- (Langmuir, Freundlich and Jovanovic), three- (Toth, Sips and Radke-Prausnitz), and four-parameter models (Fritz-Schlunder and Marczewski-Jaroniec) were used to describe the adsorption process. The four-parameter isotherms are best covered by experimental points and most accurately describe the events of adsorption of acid dye on the surface and in the interior of the new adsorbent particles obtained from ready–made garment cotton waste. The results of this research suggest the possibility of practical application in the decolorization of the colored waste waters of the textile industry providing a contribution to protecting the environment from both an economic and a practical point of view.

Aleksandra Micic, Dragan Djordjevic, Ivona Jankovic Castvan, Nenad Cirkovic, Bratislav Todorovic