[MgO-Biochar for the Adsorption of Phosphate in Water]

A novel composite material MgO-biochar (MgO-BC) with the peanut shells as the precursors was successfully fabricated by loading magnesium oxide (MgO) on the surface of biochar (BC) at high temperature and in oxygen-limited atmosphere. The adsorption characteristics of the resultant adsorbent toward phosphate from aqueous solution were investigated by evaluating the influences of pH, contact time and coexisting ions. The results showed that the best phosphate adsorption onto MgO-BC happened in the pH range of 7-9, and strong acidic or basic media was unfavorable to the phosphate adsorption. Phosphate adsorption process could reach equilibrium within 540 min, and the kinetics curve could be well fitted by both pseudo-first and pseudo-second models. The related coefficients were 97.3% and 99.0%. MgO-BC exhibited highly selective capacity toward phosphate in the presence of competing Cl^-, HCO₃^- and NO₃^- at 10 times higher concentration than the phosphate concentration. In addition, phosphate adsorption onto MgO-BC could be described satisfactorily by Langmuir model with a fitting coefficient of higher than 99%, and the maximal adsorption capacity calculated by Langmuir equation was 138.07 mg·g^-1. The adsorption capacity of phosphate by MgO-BC was much higher than the unmodified BC and other biochar-based sorbents. Furthermore, the composite material after the adsorption of phosphate could also be used as a fertilizer into the soil. It achieved the reuse of the discarded phosphate. All the results validated that MgO-BC has a wide application prospect for the phosphate cleanup from the actual wastewater.