Comparative Study of Adsorption for Chitosan, Sand and Chitosan Coated Sand

The contamination of soil and water by metals all over the world continues to pose a serious danger to the environment and human health. Chitosan is a well-known and efficient metal chelator, but its practical use is limited due to the relatively high costs of constructing clean-up devices (filters) from chitosan alone. Chitosan coated sand (CCS) was used as an adsorbent for the adsorption of chromium metal ions. The various physical parameters like adsorbate concentration, adsorbent dose, contact time have been studied. The maximum percentage of adsorption of chromium was found for chitosan, CCS and sand, and the maximum adsorption was obtained for the system CCS. The SEM images of chitosan and chitosan coated sand were studied. The possible recovery and reuse of the adsorbent material was done by recovering chromium using desorption studies. The possibility of using chitosan-coated sand to build inexpensive large-scale barrier filters for metal removal from moving contaminated groundwater plumes was found to be effective.