Preparation and characterization of green adsorbent from waste glass and its application for the removal of heavy metals from well water

Waste glass disposal causes environmental problems in the cities. To find a suitable green environmental solution for this problem low cost adsorbent in this study was prepared from waste glass. An effective new green adsorbent was synthesized by hydrothermal treatment of waste glass (WG), followed by acidic activation of its surface by HCl (WGP). The prepared adsorbent was characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray fluorescence (XRF), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and BET surface measurement. The developed adsorbent was used for the removal of heavy metals (Cd, Cu, Fe, Pb and Zn) from well water. Batch experiments were conducted to test the ability of the prepared adsorbent for the removal of Cd, Cu, Fe, Pb and Zn from well water. The experiments of the heavy metals adsorption by adsorbent (WGP) were performed at different metal ion concentrations, solution pH, adsorbent dosage and contact time. The Langmuir and Freundlich adsorption isotherms and kinetic models were used to verify the adsorption performance. The results indicated high removal efficiencies (99-100%) for all the studied heavy metals at pH 7 at constant contact time of 2 h. The data obtained from adsorption isotherms of metal ions at different time fitted well to linear form of the Langmuir sorption equation, and pseudo-second-order kinetic model. Application of the resulted conditions on well water demonstrated that the modified waste glass adsorbent successfully adsorbed heavy metals (Cd, Cu, Fe, Pb and Zn) from well water.