Heavy Metal Removal from Wastewater of Palm Oil Mill Using Developed Activated Carbon from Coconut Shell and Cow Bones

Abstract

Palm oil mill efluent (POME) is the major industrial waste water in Malaysia and Indonesia. The processing of (POME) before discharge is a major challenge to researchers. In this study, the adsorption experiment of zinc ion from (POME) produced from the processed palm oil as primary treatment has been investigated using coconut shell and cow bone activated carbon. Experiments were conducted at a fixed initial concentration, contact time, shaking speed and at different adsorbent dosage to obtain optimum condition for the uptake of zinc ion from POME. The coconut shell carbon exhibited better removal efficiency than the cow bone powder. The results obtained at fixed condition of pH 7, contact time of 105 minutes, shaking speed of 150 rpm showed more than 90% uptake for both adsorbents. The result of the adsorption study was further analyzed using Langmuir and BET model to determine the experimental isotherm. The result showed that equilibrium data fitted better with BET model for coconut shell carbon and better with Langmuir model for cow bone powder. The result of the adsorption experiments showed that heavy metal of zinc can be sufficiently reduced on both coconut shell carbon and the cow bone powder. The morphology of both adsorbents was observed using the scanning electron microscope (SEM), the pore sizes of the adsorbents supported the uptake of zinc ion from the raw POME.