Preparation of Sorbents Containing Straetlingite Phase from Zeolitic By-Product and Their Performance for Ammonium Ion Removal

In this study, straetlingite-based sorbents were used for NH4+ ion removal from a synthetic aqueous solution and from the wastewater of an open recirculation African catfish farming system. This study was performed using column experiments with four different filtration rates (2, 5, 10, and 15 mL/min). It was determined that breakthrough points and sorption capacity could be affected by several parameters such as flow rate and mineral composition of sorption materials. In the synthetic aqueous solution, NH4+ removal reached the highest sorption capacity, i.e., 0.341 mg/g with the S30 sorbent at a filtration rate of 10 mL/min and an initial concentration of 10 mg/L of NH4+ ions. It is important to emphasize that, in this case, the Ce/C0 ratio of 0.9 was not reached after 420 min of sorption. It was also determined that the NH4+ sorption capacity was influenced by phosphorus. In the wastewater, the NH4+ sorption capacity was almost seven times lower than that in the synthetic aqueous solution. However, it should be highlighted that the P sorption capacity reached 0.512 mg/g. According to these results, it can be concluded that straetlingite-based sorbents can be used for NH4+ ion removal from a synthetic aqueous solution, as well as for both NH4+ and P removal from industrial wastewater. In the wastewater, a significantly higher sorption capacity of the investigated sorbents was detected for P than for NH4+.

Ammonium ion removal from aqueous solutions using fly ash derived zeolites by alkaline fusion

In this study, fly ash (FA) with different chemical compositions was converted into zeolites by a fusion method, as confirmed by Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR). FA was obtained from three different thermal power plants in Bosnia and Herzegovina: Ugljevik, Stanari and Gacko. In the FA spectrum, a quite wide absorption band was observed at 1097 cm-1, while in those of the synthesized zeolites, this absorption band is narrowed and elongated and displaced toward 972 cm-1. These characteristic bands can be attributed to substitution of Si4+ with Al3+ in the tetrahedron, during the formation of alumosilicate and their interaction with Na+ ions. Chemical analysis has shown that the dominant component was SiO2 in the FA Ugljevik (UF) and FA Stanari (SF) with mass fractions of - 36.43 and 48.18 %, respectively and CaO in the FA Gacko (GF) with the mass fraction of 65.89 %. In studies of ammonium ion adsorption equilibrium was achieved after 24 h in zeolites of UF and SF, while for the GF sample it was necessary 48 h to reach the equilibrium. Kinetic studies of have shown that the adsorption process on all zeolites followed the Elovich model with high values of the coefficient of determination. The largest amounts of adsorbed ammonium ions were measured at the pH 8 amounting to 5.98, 6.54 and 4.23 mg NH?+/g zeolite for UF, SF and GF, respectively. Examination of adsorption isotherms have shown the better agreement of the obtained results with the Langmuir model for the SF zeolite sample, and the Tempkin model for the UF and GF zeolite samples. Regenerated zeolites have shown similar adsorption capacities for ammonium ions (for UFr 10.3 mg/g; for SF 12.0 mg/g; for GFr 7.8 mg/g) as initial zeolites (for UF 12.2 mg/g; for SF 12.1 mg/g; for GF 14.3 mg/g). Examination of adsorption isotherms of regenerated samples has also shown the best agreement with the Langmuir model for all regenerated samples. The obtained similar and even higher removal percentages of ammonium ions from a real sample of wastewater by using regenerated zeolites (for UFr 60.7 %; for SFr 55.2%; and for GFr 30.7 %) as compared to the initial ones (for UF 45.1 %; for SF 60.6%; for GF 26.0 %) show potentials of the synthesized zeolites from fly ash for ammonium ion removal from wastewaters.

Preparation of Zeolite from Waterworks Sludge for Ammonium Ion Removal in Wastewater

An appropriate disposal technology should be developed for a mass of waterworks sludge (WWS) as the solid waste. While, it can be used to produce zeolite, containing a lot of aluminum and silicate elements. In addition, the synthetic zeolite was widely used because of smaller particle size and higher purity than clinoptilolite. Therefore, the WWS and sodium hydroxide were adopted as raw material; the synthetic zeolite was used as seed crystals to obtain WWS zeolite by induce crystallization, under normal pressure at 125 ºC. The adsorption and exchange capacity of WWS zeolite was 18.3 mg/g when the initial concentration of ammonium ion was 100 mg/L in wastewater.