Characterizations and fluoride adsorption performance of wattle humus biosorbent

Considering the serious health effects of fluoride contamination, an environment friendly bioadsorbent was derived from wattle humus for fluoride removal by conventional thermal activation process. Analytical characterizations revealed that heterogeneous morphological textured wattle humus enabled remarkable adsorption capacity. XPS analysis substantiated that fluoride had been successfully adsorbed on to the carbonized wattle humus surface through chemisorption. Fluoride adsorption efficiency was systematically rationalized via batch adsorption studies. Experiments were performed at different initial fluoride concentration and scrutinized the impact of contact time (10-120 min), adsorbent dosage (0.5-2.5 g), pH (2.0-9.0), and interfering co-existing ions (SO₄^2-, NO₃^-, Cl^-, and HCO₃^-) on fluoride removal. Even at different adsorbate dosage (2-10 mg/L), 98% fluoride removal efficiency was achieved under pH > 6. The competitive anions do not interfere the wattle humus fluoride adsorption capacity. Moreover, the adsorption isotherms and kinetics studies inferred that monolayer and multilayer adsorption behavior by wattle humus leads to noticeable fluoride adsorption. Adsorbent regeneration test affirms that regenerated adsorbent found higher (>95%) fluoride removal efficiency even at five recycle runs.