Chromium removal with walnut shells and oak branches, adsorption studies, and kinetics

This study investigates the chromium sorption properties of walnut shells (WS) and oak branches (OB), both of which were modified using NaOH and lactic acid treatments. The characterization of these adsorbents was carried out using Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), point of zero charge (pHpzc) analysis, and Brunauer–Emmett–Teller (BET) surface area measurements. According to BET results, WS exhibited higher surface area values compared to OB. The pH and pHpzc measurements revealed that acidic functional groups are more prevalent than basic ones on both adsorbents. Batch experiments were conducted to evaluate the chromium ion sorption capacities of WS and OB. To further understand the adsorption mechanism, the Langmuir, Freundlich, and Dubinin-Radushkevich (D-R) isotherm models were analyzed, with the Langmuir and Freundlich models being widely recognized for describing adsorption in single-solute systems. The equilibrium data aligned best with the Langmuir isotherm, while the kinetic data were modeled using pseudo-first-order and pseudo-second-order kinetics. The maximum chromium sorption capacity for WS was determined to be 30.51 mg/g. The energy values calculated from the D-R equation for chromium adsorption onto WS and OB were 13.49 kJ/mol and 15.71 kJ/mol, respectively, indicating that the adsorption process is primarily driven by physical adsorption.