Production of activated carbon from African star apple seed husks, oil seed and whole seed for wastewater treatment

a b s t r a c t African star apple seed husks, oil seed and whole seed were used for activated carbon production for the treatment and elimination of suspended and dissolved particles from industrial waste water. The activated carbon was produced using chemical activation method with phosphoric acid (H3PO4) and zinc chloride (ZnCl2) as the activating agents at a carbonization temperature of 500 �C. The morphological interpretations and functional groups of the activated carbon were observed using scanning electron microscopy and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy respectively. Results obtained from the various pollution indicators showed an appreciably improvement on the quality of the water. The pH, temperature, total suspended solids, total dissolved solids and biological oxygen demand were determined with variation of the contact time of the activated carbons with the industrial wastewater. Seed husks of zinc chloride and Oil seed of phosphoric acid produced an activated carbon with the highest adsorptive performance for pH, temperature, Total Dissolved solids (TDS), Total suspended solids (TSS) and Biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) removal at 7.01, 7.14; 25.1 �C, 25.0 �C; 24.20 mg/L, 21.09 mg/L; 17.64 mg/L, 15.4 mg/L and 6.28 mg/L, 4.8 mg/L respectively at 150min and yield of 75.2% and 54.3%