Adsorption of Methylene Blue onto Chemically Prepared Activated Carbon from Date Palm Pits: Kinetics and Thermodynamics

Three activated carbons were prepared using phosphoric acid (P) as an activating agent from date palm pits (DPP) as a precursor via thermal pretreatment producing (CP212, CP214 and CP124) samples, where the ratio of raw material to phosphoric acid is (2: land 1:2) respectively at curing time two days for first sample and four days for the second and third sample, the activating temperature was 550 degrees C, the precursor was washed with distilled water, dried, crushed, and then sieved. In order to study the effect of phosphoric acid modification, the characteristics of the activated carbon produced were determined before and after acid modification and subsequently compared. These characteristics include surface morphology, surface area, average pore diameter and pore volume. Characterization results showed that modification of date palm pits with phosphoric acid enhanced the surface area of the activated carbon from 427.8 to620.3 m(2)/g. The average pore diameter was also enhanced from 1.14 to 1.82 nm. SEM analysis confirmed the improvement in surface area and pore development resulting from the phosphoric acid modification.