Kinetic studies of cobalt ion removal from aqueous solutions using fly ash-based geopolymer and zeolite NaX as sorbents

This study explored the cobalt ions removal efficiency from aqueous solutions by the sorption process on geopolymer and zeolite NaX. The influence of concentration and temperature on the sorption process was examined. FTIR and SEM analyses were conducted to elucidate the structure of sorbents. An additional goal was to test the experimental kinetic data using several kinetic models. A kinetic study has shown that the best fit is achieved when the Blanchard model was applied, suggesting that the sorption of cobalt ions on geopolymer and zeolite NaX is a second-order reaction.