Efficient Adsorption on Benzoyl and Stearoyl Cellulose to Remove Phenanthrene and Pyrene from Aqueous Solution

Benzoyl and stearoyl acid grafted cellulose were synthesized by a simple chemical grafting method. Using these as chemical adsorbents, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), like pyrene and phenanthrene, were effectively removed from aqueous solution. The structural and morphological properties of the synthesized adsorbents were determined through X-ray diffraction analysis (XRD), thermal gravimetric analysis (TGA), Fourier transform infrared (FT-IR), FE-SEM, and NMR analyses. Through this method, it was confirmed that benzoyl and stearoyl acid were successfully grafted onto the surface of cellulose. The 5 mg of stearoyl grafted cellulose (St–Cell) remove 96.94% pyrene and 97.61% phenanthrene as compared to unmodified cellulose, which adsorbed 1.46% pyrene and 2.99% phenanthrene from 0.08 ppm pyrene and 0.8 ppm phenanthrene aqueous solution, suggesting that those results show a very efficient adsorption performance as compared to the unmodified cellulose.