A Preliminary Study on the Potential Dye Adsorbance by Activated Meretrix lamarckii (M. lamarckii) Shells

Abstract

Dyestuff manufacturing and consuming industry have led to water pollution through their discharge of untreated wastewater. Presence of dye pigments in water bodies may cause carcinogenic, mutagenic effects and caused harm to the entire aquatic ecosystem. This research has carried out to examine the adsorption potential of treated Meretrix lamarckii (M. lamarckii) shells towards Malachite Green (MG) dye removal. Activation with hydrochloric acid (HCl) and potassium hydroxide (KOH) was used for the conversion of seashells into TS1 and TS2 respectively. Following that, batch adsorption studies were carried out at 30°C using TS1 and TS2 to study the effect of contact time, pH, initial concentration of adsorbate and adsorbent dosage on dye removal percentage. The optimized contact time for TS1 was 210 minutes, with the best performance in pH 10 aqueous medium, 10 mg/L initial concentration of MG and optimum dosage of 1.0 g. Whereas for TS2, the optimized contact time was shorter than TS1, which was only 90 minutes to attain equilibrium state. The optimized pH and initial concentration of adsorbate were the same as TS1. While optimized adsorbent dosage for TS2 was lower than that of TS1, which was 0.8 g. Based on the results obtained, TS2 was found to be more effective in MG dye removal than TS1. High efficiency of TS2 was due to the presence of alkyl halide group and its larger total surface area. From the study, it can be concluded that treated M. lamarckii possesses high adsorption efficiency and potential to become a new introduce adsorbent in wastewater treatment technology.