Adsorption of Methylene Blue from Textile Industrial Wastewater onto Activated Carbon of Parthenium hysterophorus

Many of the basic dyes are non- degradable and toxic pollutants in textile industrial wastewater. Methylene blue (MB) is a cationic dye that exists at a large scale in the textile wastewater which is discharged into the nearby environment without proper management, particularly in developing countries including Ethiopia. Therefore, this study aimed to evaluate the adsorption performance of MB from textile wastewater using locally prepared activated carbon produced from Parthenium hysterophorus stem. The plant samples were activated using H3PO4. The activated carbon was then characterized using proximate analysis, scanning electron microscope and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy. Batch adsorption studies were conducted to determine the optimum condition for removal of MB from synthetic and real textile industrial wastewater under the effect of pH, contact time, adsorbent dose, and initial MB concentration. The adsorption isotherms were checked using Langmuir and Freundlich isotherms models. The result of the proximate analysis has shown that the activated carbon was composed of 5.7% moisture, 15.3% ash, 18.6% volatile matter and 60.4% fixed carbon. Using an aqueous solution, the maximum MB removal of 94% was achieved at the pH value 11, contact time 100 min, adsorbent dose 2 g in 100 mL and at the initial MB concentration 100 mg/L, whereas the maximum removal of MB from actual textile wastewater was found to be 91%. The Langmuir isotherm model was best fitted with experimental values at R2 was 0.99. Finally, it can be concluded that the activated carbon has a good adsorption capability and promising for MB removal from textile wastewater at an industrial scale.