Removal of Mercury from chlor-alkali Industry Wastewater using Acetobacter xylinum Cellulose

Abstract

In this study, the removal of mercury ions by cellulose of Acetobacter xylinum was investigated in the synthetic and chlor-alkali wastewater. Biofilms of Acetobacter xylinum were grown in laboratory column bioreactors. The biofilms were continuously treated with sterile synthetic model wastewater or nonsterile, neutralized chloralkali wastewater.The extent of adsorption was studied as function of pH, adsorbent dose and contact time. Efficiency of mercury ion removal from chlor-alkali industry wastewater by aluminum sulfate and ferric chloride was also determined. Under acidic condition the adsorption of mercury by cellulose was quite low and increasing processing time more than10min has no remarkably effect on the adsorption rate. Adsorption capacity of cellulose under dynamic condition for chlor-alkali wastewater was 65µg/g which was less than the value (80µg/g) that obtained from batch adsorption experiments for synthetic wastewater.