Industrial Wood Dyes Removal from Aqueous Solutions by Multifunctional Carbons Derived from Polyacrylonitrile

Wastewater containing synthetic dyes harmful to aquatic environments supposes significant challenges for treatment. This study focuses on how structural characteristics of three N-containing carbons synthesized at high temperatures from polyacrylonitrile (PAN) as a precursor, i.e., an N-doped (PAN-C), an activated carbon (PAN-C-Act), and a carbon also incorporating sulfur (PAN-S-C), influence adsorption of a common dye employed for wood veneers (Red GRA 200%). The impact of pH (1.9–2.3, 6.0–6.8, and 11.8–12.6), adsorbent dosage (S/L, 0.43–0.53 and 1.73–1.91 g L−1), and amount of dye (24–28 mg L−1 and 231–285 mg L−1) on dye removal from aqueous solutions were investigated. In general, the results obtained in the present work indicate that the presence of larger pores in the materials plays an important role in dye adsorption by preventing size exclusion of the dye molecules. The activated carbon (PAN-C-Act) demonstrated the greatest adsorption performance, with an adsorption yield close to 100% achieved at a carbon dose of 0.47 g L−1 and acidic pH for the highest dye concentration and longest experiment time. The pseudo-second-order model best described the kinetics, and both external mass transfer and intra-particle diffusion were confirmed.