Synthesis of Ceria Nanopowder for the removal of Hexavalent Chromium from synthetic Cr (VI) solution

Abstract

Hexavalent chromium is a toxic form of chromium metal generally used in many industrial applications for its anticorrosive properties. Removal of chromium from water is obligatory in order to avoid the chromium contamination. From literature review it is found that water containing hexavalent chromium causes severe health problems throughout the world. There are several methods like chemical precipitation, electro-dialysis, photo-catalysis, ion exchange method, activated carbon adsorption or bio sorption, solvent extraction, reverse osmosis. Which are used to remove chromium from the water but they are not feasible in all places and conditions due to various serious limitations. Among all the technique available, adsorption is one of the most suitable because of its useful process. But the efficiency of the process depends on the adsorption media. Though there are several adsorbent available still there are huge scopes to develop a number of adsorption media for the benefit of the common people. In this work the Ceria nanopowder is synthesized by using Cerium chloride and sulphuric acid at a pH of 7, an attempt has been made to remove the chromate by Ceria nanopowder in batch mode. The adsorbent is characterized by various analytical techniques like FTIR, SEM, XRD, BET and AAS. The percentage removal of hexavalent chromium was studied as a function of pH of the solution, contact time, dosage of adsorbent and reaction temperature. The removal of chromium from the synthetic solution having initial Cr (VI) concentration of 100 mg/L was found to be 86.4 % at an optimal condition of pH 6, adsorbent dose 0.07mg/100ml, temperature 300C and contact time of 30 minutes.