Malaysian Journal of Analytical Sciences Vol 22 No 2 (2018): 326 - 332

CHARACTERISTICS OF RICE HUSK BIOCHAR BLENDED WITH COAL FLY ASH FOR POTENTIAL SORPTION MATERIAL

(Ciri-Ciri Gabungan Biochar dari Sekam Padi dengan Abu Terbang Arang Batu Sebagai Potensi Bahan Penjerab)

Nurul Farhana Ahmad¹, Azil Bahari Alias¹*, Norhayati Talib¹, Zulkifli Abd Rashid¹, Wan Azlina Wan Ab Karim Ghani²

¹Faculty of Chemical Engineering,

Universiti Teknologi MARA, 40450 Shah Alam, Selangor Darul Ehsan, Malaysia

²Department of Chemical and Environmental Engineering,

Universiti Putra Malaysia, 43400 Serdang, Selangor Darul Ehsan, Malaysia

*Corresponding author: azilbahari@salam.uitm.edu.my

Received: 15 February 2017; Accepted: 2 January 2018

Abstract

Biochar has received a great attention recently due to abundant biomass left in Malaysia. Besides that, the application of biochar in environmental aspects widely used in the world to improvise soil fertility and water quality. In this research, biochar is produced from rice husk (RH) by pyrolysis at 500 °C using fixed-bed tube reactor. Then the biochar will be blended with coal fly ash (CFA) using the ratio of rice husk biochar (RHB) to CFA (0.2:0.8, 0.5:0.5, and 0.8:0.2) to be further analyzed on their characteristics. From proximate analysis, the ash content is increasing while moisture content, volatile matter, and fixed carbon decrease as the ratio are decrease. For determination of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen and sulphur, the result from ultimate analysis indicates that hydrogen, carbon and nitrogen increase as the ratio increases. Based on the BET result, the surface area is increase proportionally to the ratio (0.2:0.8, 0.5:0.5, 0.8:0.2). Based on this research, RHB has a great potential to be applied as an adsorbent. However, blended RH with CFA are not giving desire result to be used an adsorbent. It is believed that introduction of CFA will offer some magnetic effect to the sorbant to attract pollutants.

Keywords: biochar, biomass, coal fly ash, pyrolysis, rice husk

Abstrak

Biochar telah diberi perhatian besar baru-baru ini disebabkan kuantiti biojisim terbuang ini yang amat banyak di Malaysia. Selain itu, biochar ini banyak digunakan di dalam aspek alam sekitar iaitu secara meluas untuk penambahbaikkan kesuburan tanah dan kualiti air. Dalam penyelidikan ini, biochar dihasilkan dari sekam padi (RH) oleh proses pirolisis pada 500 °C menggunakan reaktor tiub lapisan tetap. Kemudian biochar akan dicampurkan dengan abu terbang (CFA) batu arang menggunakan nisbah sekam padi biochar (RHB) kepada CFA (0.2:0.8, 0.5:0.5 dan 0.8:0.2) seterusnya dianalisis ciri-ciri mereka. Dari analisis proksimat, kandungan abu bertambah manakala kandungan lembapan, jirim meruap dan karbon tetap berkurang dengan pengurangan nisbah RHB kepada CFA. Untuk nilai karbon, hidrogen, oksigen, nitrogen dan sulfur, keputusan dari analisis muktamad menunjukkan kadar hidrogen, karbon dan nitrogen dan sulfur meningkat dengan peningkatan nisbah RHB kepada CFA. Berdasarkan keputusan BET, luas permukaan meningkat secara berkadaran kepada nisbah (0.2:0.8, 0.5:0.5, 0.8:0.2) RHB kepada CFA. Berdasarkan penyelidikan ini, RHB mempunyai potensi besar untuk digunakan sebagai satu bahan penjerap. Walaubagaimanapun, dengan mencampurkan RH dengan CFA tidak memberi keputusan positif untuk diguna pakai sebagai bahan penjerap. Penambahan CFA dipercayai akan memberi kesan magnet kepada bahan penjerab bagi menarik bahan pencemar.

Kata kunci: biochar, biojisim, abu terbang arang batu, pirolisis, sekam padi

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