Adsorption of Methylene Blue by Activated Carbon Derived from Bamboo Wastewith Physico-chemical Activation

As bamboo is a natural abundant resource in Thailand, therefore it was used to prepare activated carbon in this study. Activated carbon was synthesised from bamboo furniture waste with physico-chemical activation. Bamboo waste precursor was impregnated before pyrolysis in 25% (by volume) potassium hydroxide solution with 2:1 of precursor/solution mass ratio for 8 h. The slurry then was dried and pyrolysed under nitrogen atmosphere from room temperature to a preferred final temperature (600 to 900 C). Next activation process took place with carbon dioxide (CO2) at a flow rate of 300 mL min-1for 1 h. After the synthesis, activated carbon was treated with hydrochloric (HCl) solution. The result showed that activated carbon synthesised at 800 C gave the best properties in terms of adsorption of iodine solution, BET surface area and total pore volume. The Langmuir isotherm better fitted to the adsorption of methylene blue than the Freundlich isotherm.