Removal of Pb(II) from Water using Al₂O₃-SiO₂ Nanoparticles

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In this study, Al₂O₃-SiO₂ nanoparticle by the weight ratio 50:50 of Al₂O₃/SiO₂was studied to obtain an effective adsorbent for the removal of Pb(II)ion from aqueous solution. In this research, a simple, economic and environment-friendly method has been presented for the preparation of Al₂O₃-SiO₂ nanoparticle via sol-gel method. The structure of prepared nanoparticle was characterized by FTIR, BET, SEM, XRD and EDX. The SEM analysis shows that the average size of the particles is about 40 nm and BET analyzer data shows that the average pore size and surface area of the material are 4.9522 nm and 163.58 m²/g respectively. Various factors influence the adsorption of Pb(II) ion such as contact time, the amount of adsorbent and pH value of the solutions which were investigated by batch experiments. The adsorption was fast; nearly 98% of Pb (II) could be removed within 10 min. The equilibrium data was applied to Langmuir, Freundlich, Tempkin, isotherm models. Adsorption isotherm fitted well by Freundlich model. The maximum adsorption capacity is 37.03 mg/g at pH = 8.0. Kinetics data revealed that the overall adsorption process followed pseudo-second-order. This study proves that Al₂O₃-SiO₂ nanoparticle was an effective adsorbent for removal of Pb(II) ion from aqueous solutions.