Evaluation of Activity Coal Fly Ash as Low Cost an Adsorbent for the Removal of Pollutants: Equilibrium and Isotherm Studies of Pharmaceutical Compounds

In this work, a coal fly ash (CFA) as a waste generated from chimney furnaces was tested as a low-cost adsorbent to streptomycin (SPM) drug removal from aqueous solution. Treatment of the samples coal fly ash was performed to reduce cost the of end use. CFA composition depends on the kind of coal utilized and has crystalline and no crystalline character. CFA is a valuable material and extensively utilized in cement production and as a higher adsorbent for water treatment. The physical properties like surface area, morphology, porosity, and chemical composition (alumina, iron oxide, silica, and titania) make CFA efficient material for wastewater treatment. The CFA was characterized via chemical and physical techniques, like FE-SEM, TEM, and EDX. The best optimum condition of adsorption method for SPM drug removal onto CFA, several factors were studied like, effect of contact time solution pH, concentration of drug, adsorbent dosage, and solution temperature. The percentage removal of SPM drug increased while the modified CFA dosage increased. The removal percentage % of drug increased with decreased drug concentration, also increased with increase quantity of CFA. The best of SPM drug removal found 91.76 % at concentration of drug 10 g/mL, adsorbent dosage 0.05 g, temperature 25 oC, and solution pH of 6.6. The adsorption models were tested with two isotherms like isotherm Langmuir, and isotherm Freundlich, the adsorption model was found to follow the model Freundlich.