Phosphate dsorption from aqueous solution by mesoporous adsorbent Fe-SBA-15

The excessive amount of phosphorus (P) in water could lead to environment pollution such as eutrophication. Thus, an effective and economical way of removing phosphorus must to be developed. In this study, Fe-SBA-15 was synthesized to investigate the adsorption capacity of phosphorus. The structure and morphology of Fe-SBA-15 were tested by scanning electronic microscopy and transmission electron microscope. According to the experiments, the 30%Fe-SBA-15 exhibited the best phosphorus removal efficiency among different percentages of Fe. The influence of time, adsorbent dose, initial phosphorus concentration, pH and comparative ion were tested in this study. The adsorption rate of phosphorus increases with the increase of adsorption dose. The influence of comparative ion followed the order SO4 2-> NO3 ->Cl-. The optimistic pH for adsorption was 3.2. The adsorption of phosphorus onto Fe-SBA-15 reached equilibrium in about 80 minutes. The results demonstrated that Fe-SBA-15 is a potential candidate for removing phosphorus from contaminated water.