Arsenic removal from groundwater by a newly developed adsorbent

A novel adsorbent, which had been developed for phosphate adsorption, was adopted for arsenic removal from groundwater. Adsorption isotherm, pH dependence of the isotherm and adsorption rate were studied by batch method. Furthermore, by using a granular adsorbent of 1.8 mm diameter which is commercially available, lab-scale experiments of continuous adsorption treatment of actual groundwater containing arsenic at 50 mg m⁻³ were conducted to examine the performance of the adsorbent. A large amount of arsenic, i.e., 10 g As kg⁻¹, was adsorbed at pH 7.0 and 10 mg As m⁻³ in equilibrium concentration. It was only a 5% higher amount compared to conventional activated alumina. However, twice the bed volume, i.e., total volume of effluent divided by empty column volume, was achieved till breakthrough by using this novel adsorbent. This may be because the pH decrease, which enlarges apparent adsorption capacity of the adsorbent, is caused by a self-pH decrease function of the adsorbent. The self-pH decrease function must be delivered by dissociation of Al (III) aquoion. The proton release was clearly observed in batch experiments.