The purpose of the thesis was determination of the adsorption ability of biologically degradable materials, which can be found in most households and fruit processing industry as waste, in the process of cleaning coloured wastewaters polluted with the pigment screen printing colour, which can be used for printing on paper and textiles, and direct dye, used for dyeing cellulose fibres.
Dried and grounded peels of apples, lemons, oranges, mandarins, avocados, and fresh (ripe) banana, semi-dried banana and banana peel were used as biodegradable adsorbents. For comparison, the already established adsorbents such as granular and powdered activated carbon, zeolite, alumina, and chitosan were used. Adsorptive treatment of prepared coloured wastewater was studied at room temperature for one to three weeks. Treatment efficiency was determined by visual and spectrophotometric assessment of the colour of wastewater.
Semi-dried banana and dried, grounded dried lemon peels gave the best results among biodegradable adsorbents in the treatment of both coloured wastewaters and were even more effective than the commercially used activated carbon. Grounded dried apple, orange and mandarin peels also showed the adsorption ability in the coloured wastewaters. Chitosan and alumina achieved as a high level of discoloration
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