Reduced Graphene Oxide for Removal of Carbendazim from Waste Water

Abstract

The extensive use of carbendazim, a non-biodegradable fungicide, has raised an issue due to its environmental toxicity and accumulation in water bodies. This study is focused on removal of carbendazim from agriculture runoff water using reduced graphene oxide (rGO). Graphene oxide (GO) was synthesised by the modified Hummers' method and reduced to rGO using sodium borohydride (NaBH4) to enhance its adsorption capacity. Several analytical techniques, including FTIR, XRD, FE-SEM, and EDS analysis were utilized which 1paved the way to successful reduction and structural modifications of GO to rGO. In the adsorption optimisation studies were carried out to evaluate the effects of dose, pH, and starting pollutant concentration. The maximum carbendazim removal occurred at an rGO dosage of 5 mg/L achieved the highest removal efficiency of 98% for a 5ppm concentration carbendazim solution at neutral pH (pH 7). The high performance of rGO is due to its many functional groups that contain oxygen and its layered structure, which allows it to strongly interact with carbendazim molecules. The EPA reported that carbendazim concentration of natural water bodies observed high as 0.05mg/l; hence, current study used adsorption of 5 ppm solution of carbendazim. It is observed that rGO is an efficient material for the degradation of carbendazim and offers a futuristic solution for the remediation in large-scale treatment systems for environmental protection and agricultural wastewater management.