Equilibrium modelling of individual and simultaneous biosorption of chromium(VI) and nickel(II) onto dried activated sludge.

The biosorption of chromium(VI) and nickel(II) ions, both singly and in combination, by dried activated sludge was investigated in a batch system as a function of initial pH and single- and dual-metal ion concentrations. The working initial pH values for single chromium(VI) and nickel(II) biosorptions were determined as 1.0 and 4.5, respectively. It was observed that the co-ion effect on the equilibrium uptake became more pronounced as the co-ion concentration in solution increased and pH level increased for chromium(VI) and decreased for nickel(II). Adsorption isotherms were developed for both the single- and dual-metal ion systems at these two pH values and expressed by the mono- and multi-component Langmuir and Freundlich adsorption models and model parameters were estimated by the non-linear regression. It was seen that the mono-component adsorption equilibrium data fitted very well to both the mono-component adsorption models for both the components and the pH values studied while the multi-component Freundlich adsorption model adequately predicted the multi-component adsorption equilibrium data at moderate ranges of initial mixture concentrations for both the studied pH values.