Evaluation of activated carbon obtained from paulownia tree in dye removal from aqueous solution

Activated carbon is a form of carbon with an expanded surface area and a porous structure and is produced by carbonization of organic materials at high temperature in an oxygen-free environment. Chemical activation is known to be an effective method to obtain carbons with high surface area and narrow micropore distribution. The most known application areas of activated carbons are purification, removal of organic pollutants from drinking water and recovery of chemicals by selective adsorption. Their advantage is that they can effectively remove organic compounds from water by adsorbing them thanks to the large porous structure on their surface. In this study, the removal of Methylene Blue (MB) and Methyl Oxygen (MO) dyes from aqueous solutions was investigated using activated carbon produced by chemical activation with ZnCl2 from Paulownia wood. The optimum concentration values for MB and MO were determined and the effects of pH, temperature, adsorbent amount and contact time were investigated. The obtained isotherm data were analyzed according to Langmuir and Freundlich isotherm equations and it was determined that the results were in accordance with the Langmuir equation. The dye removal rate of activated carbon with time was investigated at constant dye initial concentration and the obtained data were analyzed according to pseudo-1st order and pseudo-2nd order adsorption kinetic models. The results for both dyes showed that the pseudo-2nd order model described the adsorption kinetics better.