Treatment of textile wastewater using carbon-based nanomaterials as adsorbents: a review

Waste derived from the textile industry can contain a wide variety of pollutants of organic and inorganic natures, such as dyes (e.g., acid, basic, reactive, mordant dyes) and toxic metals (e.g., lead, chromium, cadmium). The presence of pollutants at high concentrations in textile waste makes them relevant sources of pollution in the environment. To solve this problem, various technologies have been developed for the removal of pollutants from these matrices. Thus, adsorption emerges as an efficient alternative for textile waste remediation, providing advantages as simplicity of operation, economy, possibility of using different adsorbent materials, and developing on-line systems that allow the reuse of the adsorbent during several adsorption/desorption cycles. This review will initially propose an introduction to the adsorption world, its fundamentals, and aspects related to kinetics, equilibrium, and thermodynamics. The possible mechanisms through which a pollutant can be retained on an adsorbent will be explained. The analytical techniques that offer valuable information to characterize the solid phases as well as each adsorbate/adsorbent system will be also commented. The most common synthesis techniques to obtain carbon nano-adsorbents have been also presented. In addition, the latest advances about the use of these adsorbents for the removal of pollutants from textile waste will be presented and discussed. The contributions reported in this manuscript demonstrated the use of highly efficient carbon-based nano-adsorbents for the removal of both organic and inorganic pollutants, reaching removal percentages from 65 to 100%.