Synthesis of Zeolites from Coal Fly Ash Using Alkaline Fusion and Its Applications in Removing Heavy Metals

Abstract

The article presents studies of the influence of parameters of synthesis modes and alkali concentration on the synthesis of zeolite materials from coal fly ash (CFA). The purpose of the study was to synthesise zeolite materials from CFA using the method of alkaline fusion and to determine the susceptibility of selected heavy-metal ions to removal from solutions in an ion exchange process on a selected mesoporous zeolite. It was found that the crystalline phase of sodalite was dominated in all of the samples synthesized. The specific surface area (SBET) of the samples was evaluated using the standard Brunauer–Emmett–Teller (BET) method using N2 sorption. Crystalline zeolite materials have been used to study the efficiency of removing heavy metals from aqueous solutions of Ni2+, Cd2+ and Pb2+. The adsorption data were analyzed using the Langmuir and Freundlich isotherm model. When comparing the estimated coefficient of determination (r2), it was noticed that the sorption data are more accurately described by the Langmuir isotherm and the pseudo-second-order kinetic model. The results of metal adsorption experiments suggest that the synthesized zeolite material has great potential to be used as an inexpensive and alternative source in the production of adsorbents.