Synthesis, Characterization and Application of Nanomaterials for the Removal of Emerging Pollutants from Industrial waste water, Kinetics and Equilibrium Model

Nanotechnology is an emerging science offering promising models of decontamination. The present experimental design is to synthesize novel nanoparticles of Iron and Nickel oxides to be used as catalysts for in situ removal of different pollutants discharged from various industries. Particle size of synthesized iron and nickel oxides nanoparticles was characteristic of ~28-36 nm and ~48-56, respectively done with help of SEM and XRD analysis. Furthermore, the linkage of metal-oxygen linkage and red shift is confirmed through FTIR and UV-Visible spectroscopic technique, respectively. Physico-chemical characterization of industrial effluents showed remarkably higher concentration of nitrates and sulphates. Nitrates and sulphates were abundantly concentrated in leather industry effluents, designating it most polluted chemical processing industry. These results directed application of nanoparticles as adsorbents for selected removal of Nitrates and sulphates from wastewater in batch experiments. Concentration of the pollutants like sulphates and nitrates was reduced to 18 and 54 times, respectively, lower than the background concentration on application of Ni oxide nanoparticles. Kinetics model revealed pseudo second order whereas Langmuir and Freundlich equilibrium gave comparable fitness to adsorption data with regression coefficient of 0.999. The study concludes that nanotechnology provides potential and economically viable solution for removal of wastewater pollutants through synthesis of metal nano adsorbents.