Study of the Cd (II) removal in the presence of methyl orange with a natural zeolite conditioned with iron nanoparticles

This work presents a study on the removal of cadmium and/or methyl-orange dye in aqueous solution, using natural zeolite clinoptilolite, as sodium homo-ionized and impregnated with iron nanoparticles. Iron nanoparticles were synthesized in the presence of the zeolite by chemical reduction. The evaluation of the removal ability was performed in a monocomponent (cadmium or methyl-orange dye) system by varying the contact time and its initial concentration. Removal capacity in a bi-component (cadmium and methyl orange) system was also studied while varying their concentrations. The characterization of the zeolites, before and after the sorption process, was carried out using several analytical techniques. The characteristics of zeolite clinoptilolite and iron particles were observed by scanning electron microscopy. The iron particles showed diameter sizes between 60 and 200 nm, localized on the surface of the zeolite. By IR spectroscopy no structural changes were detected for any of the treatments made to the zeolitic materials. By X-ray diffraction the clinoptilolite crystalline phase was mainly identified, however, it failed to detect any phase of iron in the zeolite impregnated with iron nanoparticles. Moessbauer spectroscopy indeed detected the impregnated iron phase as iron borides. The homo-ionized and iron nanoparticles impregnated zeolite showed no change in the specific surface area, or the isoelectric point, their values were 22.3 m²/g and ph 9.8, respectively. However, whereas the active site density for the homo-ionized zeolite was 2.87 sites/nm², for iron nanoparticles impregnated zeolite was 20.32 sites/nm². As a result of the analysis of the isotherms of cadmium, the maximum sorption capacity of the homo-ionized zeolite was 35.03 mg/g and for the iron nanoparticles impregnated zeolite was 36.43 mg/g. These maximum sorption capacities represent up to 85% of removed cadmium from concentrations of 50 to 600 mg/L. For the removal of methyl orange dye case, the homo-ionized zeolite did not remove any; however, the iron nanoparticles impregnated zeolite its maximum removal capacity was 79.8 mg/g. In the two-component system the removal capacity could not be assessed due to the presence precipitates formed between the methyl-orange dye and cadmium solutions. (Author)