Kinetic modelling and mechanism of dye adsorption on unburned carbon

Textile dyeing processes are among the most environmentally unfriendly industrial processes by producing coloured wastewaters. The adsorption method using unburned carbon from coal combustion residue was studied for the decolourisation of typical acidic and basic dyes. It was discovered that the unburned carbon showed high adsorption capacity at 1.97 × 10−4 and 5.27 × 10−4 mol/g for Basic Violet 3 and Acid Black 1, respectively. The solution pH, particle size and temperature significantly influenced the adsorption capacity. Higher solution pH favoured the adsorption of basic dye while reduced the adsorption of acid dye. The adsorption of dye increased with increasing temperature but decreased with increasing particle size. Sorption kinetic data indicated that the adsorption kinetics followed the pseudo-second-order model. The adsorption mechanism consisted of two processes, external diffusion and intraparticle diffusion, and the external diffusion was the dominating process.