Compost of Aquatic Weed Myriophyllum spicatum as Low-Cost Biosorbent for Selected Heavy Metal Ions

• Published in: Water, air, and soil pollution Vol. 225; no. 4; pp. 1 - 10
• Main Authors: Milojkovic, Jelena V, Stojanovic, Mirjana D, Mihajlovic, Marija L, Lopicic, Zorica R, Petrovic, Marija S, Sostaric, Tatjana D, Ristic, Mirjana D
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Cham Springer-Verlag 01-04-2014; Springer International Publishing; Springer; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Adsorption; Analysis; Aquatic plants; Aquatic weeds; Aqueous solutions; Atmospheric Protection/Air Quality Control/Air Pollution; Binding sites; Biomass; Biosorption; Cadmium; calcium; Carbonyl compounds; Cations; Climate Change/Climate Change Impacts; Composts; Contamination; copper; Desorption; Earth and Environmental Science; Electron microscopy; Environment; Environmental monitoring; Environmental studies; Equilibrium; Experiments; Fourier analysis; Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy; Fourier transforms; Heavy metals; Hydrogeology; Infrared spectroscopy; Invasive plants; ion exchange; Kinetics; Landfill; Lead; Metal ions; Metals; Myriophyllum spicatum; Nickel; Scanning electron microscopy; soil; Soil Science & Conservation; Sorbents; Spectrum analysis; Water Quality/Water Pollution; zinc; Serbia; Waste biomass; Isotherm; Desorption; Kinetics; Competitive biosorption
• ISSN: 0049-6979; 1573-2932
• DOI: 10.1007/s11270-014-1927-8

Aquatic weed Myriophyllum spicatum L. is one of the most invasive water plants known. In many countries, it is usually harvested and landfilled, where aerobic and anaerobic decomposition takes place. In this research, the kinetic, equilibrium, and desorption studies of biosorption of Pb(II), Cu(II), Cd(II), Ni(II), and Zn(II) ions onto compost of M. spicatum were investigated in batch experiments. Biosorbent was characterized by scaning electron microscopy (SEM) and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR). SEM analysis showed that ion exchange between divalent cations Ca(II) and selected metals takes place. The results of FTIR exposed that carbonyl, carboxyl, hydroxyl, and phenyl groups are main binding sites for those heavy metal ions. The rate of adsorption of the five heavy metals was fast, which achieved equilibrium in 40 min, and followed the pseudo-second-order model well. Langmuir, Freundlich, and Sips equilibrium adsorption models were studied, and Sips isotherm gave the best fit for experimental data. Desorption by 0.1 M HNO₃ did not fully recover the metals sorbed onto the compost, indicating that reusing this material as biosorbent is not possible. Furthermore, the use of spent biosorbent as a soil fertilizer is proposed.