Kinetics and thermodynamics of Cu(II) adsorption on oil shale wastes

The oil shale waste material, retorted shale, was utilized as an adsorbent for Cu(II) removal from aqueous solution. The kinetics and thermodynamic adsorption was investigated during a series of batch adsorption experiments. The removal efficiency was controlled by solution pH, temperature, initial ion concentration and contact time. Two simple kinetic models, pseudo-first-and second-order, were used to investigate the adsorption mechanisms. The pseudo-second-order chemical reaction kinetics provides the best correlation with the experimental data. Langmuir and Freundlich models were used to fit the equilibrium data, which showed that Langmuir best-fitted these data. Thermodynamic parameters such as free energy, enthalpy and entropy were calculated to predict the nature of the adsorption process.