Use of spent oil shale to remove methyl red dye from aqueous solutions

In this study, the efficiency of spent oil shale was assessed to remove the methyl red (MR) from aqueous solution under various chemical and physical parameters. The adsorption kinetics was assessed using the pseudo-first-order and pseudo-second-order models. The results indicated that increase in the level of adsorbent led to an increase in amount of dye removed from the solution. Most of the dye was adsorbed within 90 min. MR adsorption followed pseudo-first-order model. Material extracted oil shale was characterized by several methods such as electronic scanning microscopy (ESM), energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX), and Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR). The treated oil shale showed high adsorption potential against MR in polluted wastewater.