Determination of Zn2+ ion adsorption capacity of montmorillonite clay

Abstract

Drinking water contaminated with heavy metals is a serious problem in Sri Lanka in the recent years. Therefore to provide safe drinking water, it is compulsory to remove heavy metals and we should have to use water filters. montmorillonite, which is a mineral from the smectite group and considered as a great candidate as an adsorbent material for heavy metal ions such as Zn2+in aqueous solution due to its typically elevated surface area, high availability and low cost. In this study, removal of heavy metals from water was investigated by studying adsorption of them onto montmorillonite clay material. Properties of the clay have been stabilized by a thermal treatment. The montmorillonite clay material was characterized by applying different techniques of Fourier transformation infrared spectroscopy and also the surface properties of the clay material, Scanning electron microscopy were also used to study the morphology of the samples. The obtained results showed that the raw clay has a maximum removal efficiency of 97.84 %. Among the heat treated samples, the sample heat treated at 400 ºC showed a maximum removal efficiency of 96.72 %. Further, the removal efficiency continuously decreased with the increasing treatment temperature above 400 ºC.