CHEMICAL ENGINEERING JOURNAL, vol.165, pp.56-63, 2010 (SCI-Expanded)
Two activated carbons were produced by using two different precursor peach stone and acrylonitrile-divinylbenzene copolymer Peach stone based activated carbon was produced by single step steam activation at 800 degrees C polymer based activated carbon was prepared in successive two stages air oxidation at 300 C and final carbonization at 850 C under inert atmosphere Produced carbons showed typical Type 1 nitrogen adsorption isotherms Peach stone based activated carbon has 608 m(2)/g of surface area and 0 331 cm(3)/g of micropore volume while polymer based carbon has 579 m(2)/g of surface area and 0 234 cm(3)/g of micropore volume Boehm s titration results and Fourier transform infrared spectra indicated that the produced carbons possess acidic oxygen functionalities mainly in phenolic form Polymer based activated carbon has 7 12 mmol of nitrogen/g because of the pyridine type groups in the main structure The removal of Cr(VI) from aqueous solutions by activated carbon has been investigated as a function of solution pH The maximum adsorption capacities were obtained at pH 2 in both cases and the maximum capacities were 143 mg/g 83 mg/g and 150 mg/g for peach stone based polymer based and commercial activated carbons respectively