History

Purification of water supplies by adsorption of undesirable contaminants onto solid

adsorbents has a short history compared to other processes. Adsorption was first observed
in solution by Lowitz in 1785 and was soon applied as a process for removal of color
from sugar during refining (Hasler, 1974). In latter half nineteenth century, unactivated
charcoal filters were used in American water treatment plants (Croes, 1883). Large
volumes of granular activated carbon (GAC) were manufactured during World War I for
use in gas mask. Powdered activated carbon (PAC) was used in Chicago meat packers in
the 1920s to control taste and odor in water supplies contaminated by chlorophenols
(Baylis, 1929). The first GAC units for treatment of water supplies were constructed in
Hamm, Germany in 1929 and Bay City, Michigan, in 1930. PAC was first used in
municipal water treatment in New Milford, New Jersey in 1930; its use became
widespread in the next few decades, primarily for taste and odor control.
During the mid-1970, interest in adsorption as a process for removal of organics from
drinking water heightened as the public became increasingly concerned about water
sources contaminated by industrial waste, agricultural chemicals, and sewage discharges.
Another major concern was the observed formation of thrihalomethanes (THMs) and
other known or suspected carcinogens during chlorination of water containing organic
precursors.
At present, the applications of adsorption in water treatment in the United States are
predominantly traditional traditional taste and odor control. However, adsorption is
increasingly being considered for removal of synthetic organic chemicals, color-forming
organics, and disinfection by-products and their compounds that represent a health
hazard, such as heavy metals, are also removed by adsorption. By 1977 about a quarter of
utilities in the United States used PAC; in 1975 sixty-five plants in the US used GAC
(AWWA Committee, 1977; Robert, 1975). Activated carbon remains the principal
adsorbent in full scale water treatment.
Mechanisms of Adsorption
Adsorption of substances onto adsorbents takes place because there are forces that attract
the adsorbate to the solid surface from solution. The specific forces or mechanisms by
which adsorbate is attracted to the solid solution interface can be physical or chemical.
Physical Adsorption
Electrostatic force is the basic physical principle that describes interactions between
molecules of adsorbent and adsorbate. Electrostatic attraction and repulsion based on
Coulombs Law. Other physical interactions among molecules, based on the electrostatic
force incluse dipole-dipole interactions, dispersion interactions, and hydrogen bonding.
Chemisorption
Chemical adsorption or chemisorption, is also based on electrostatic forces. The
difference between physical and chemisorption is not distict; the former less specific for
which compounds sorb to which surface sites, has weaker forces and energies of bonding,
operates over longer distances, and is moe reversible.

SITE : WATER TREATMENT PRINCIPLE AND DESIGN, JAMES M.

MONTGOMERY,p.174-175)

Adsorption, the binding of molecules or particles to a surface, must be distinguished

from absorption, the filling of pores in a solid.
(http://www.rpi.edu/dept/chem-eng/Biotech-Environ/Adsorb/adsorb.htm)
The adhesion in an extremely thin layer of molecules (as of gases, solutes, or liquids) to
the surfaces of solid bodies or liquids with which they are in contact.
(http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/adsorption)
Many treatment methods, including adsorption, coagulation, precipitation, filtration,
(bio-filtration or physical filtration), electrodialysis, membrane separation, and
oxidation have been used for the treatment of metal-containing effluents. (Mahout
and Sengil, 2003)
Adsorption has been shown to be a feasible alternative method for the removal of
trace metal ion from water (Lee and Davis, 2001)
Several and natural synthetic hydous solid have been investigated as adsorbents fo
heavy metals such as activated carbon (Seco et al., 1997), fly ash (Gupta et al.,;
Weng and Huang, 1994), metal oxides (Smith, 1998 and Amini, 2000), zeolite
(Panayotova, 2000), peat (Ho and McKay, 2000), chitosan (Wu et al., 2000) and
activated sludge (Lee and Davis, 2001; Tien and Huang, 1987)
In this research, peanut hulls has been used as an adsorbent to remove heavy metal
lead from waste water.