Behzad Ehsani - Chemical engineering faculty, Babol University of Technology, Babol, Iran
Ali Asghar Ghoreyshi
Ghasem najafpour

Presence of phenol and its derivatives in most industrial effluents is a big hazard for human and environment. In this work, hydrodynamics of phenol adsorption on commercial activated carbon was studied in a fixed bed column with inner diameter of 1.25 cm and height of 30 cm. The shape of breakthrough curve and breakthrough time are very important to describe the performance of fixed bed column. The objective of current investigation was to determine the effect of different parameters on breakthrough curve, such as, initial concentration, flow rate and bed height. The obtained resutls indicated that by increasing initial concentration and flow rate, breakthrough carve became steeper. The obtained data also confirmed that the adsorption of phenol increased with increasing initial concentration and bed height. As flow rate increased from 5 to 7.5ml.min-1, amount of uptake increased, afterward, by increasing flow rate from 7.5 to 10ml.min-1, amount of adsorption decreased again. Removal percent also decreased with an increasing in inlet concentration and flow rate. Two kinetic models: Thomas and Yan models were applied to experimental data to predict the breakthrough behavior. Both models have good fitness with experimental data

Phenol; Adsorption; Fixed bed; column; breakthrough