Vol. 12 | No. 4 |1864 - 1871| October - December | 2019 ISSN: 0974-1496 | e-ISSN: 0976-0083 | CODEN: RJCABP http://www.rasayanjournal.com http://www.rasayanjournal.co.in Rasayan J. Chem., 12(4), 1864-1871(2019) http://dx.doi.org/10.31788/RJC.2019.1245324 A NOVEL POROUS ACTIVATED CARBON COMPOUND PREPARED FOR ADSORPTION OF COBALT (CO (II)) FROM AQUEOUS SOLUTION FOR ENVIRONMENTAL POLLUTION MITIGATION Pramod Kamble 1,* Rupali H. Landge 1 , Abhijit N. Lande 1 and Vinayak P. Dhulap 2 1 Department of Environmental Sciences, Savitribai Phule Pune University, Pune 411007 2 Department of Environmental Science, School of Earth Sciences, Solapur University, Solapur-413 255 *E-mail: kpramod09@gmail.com ABSTRACT The eco-friendly and sustainable technique was developed to resolve the problem of heavy metal pollution. In the present study, the removal of cobalt (Co (II)) was carried out using the activated carbon (AC). Activated carbon compound was prepared using selected plants such as Ficus benghalensis (FB), Mangifera indica (MI), Tamarindus indica (TI), Azadirachta indica (AI) and Syzygium cumini (SC). The characterization of the products was done by using the scanning electronic microscope (SEM) in order to know the microstructure of AC. It shows that prepared activated carbons (PACs) are porous in nature having the elevated surface area for effective adsorption and applicable for the mitigation of heavy metals. The study involves the effect of dose, concentration and contact time for removal of Co (II) and to assess the efficiency of PACs. The results reveal that the adsorption of Co (II) observed to be highest at 5g PAC-AI, PAC-MI and 6g for PAC-TI, PAC-FB, PAC-SC dose, respectively. Maximum adsorption was exhibited in a solution containing 25 mg/L concentration of Co (II) after addition of a mixed dose of PACs. The comparable adsorption was observed at contact time for PAC-AI, PAC-TI, PAC-FB, PAC-SC at 120 minutes and PAC-MI for 30 minutes respectively. Moreover, it is a need for continuous monitoring and further research for the development of an eco-friendly and advanced method to remove heavy metals. Keywords: Cobalt (Co (II)), Porous activated carbon, Bio-adsorbent, Plant material © RASĀYAN. All rights reserved INTRODUCTION Anthropogenic activities are mostly responsible for causing serious threats to environmental spheres such as air, land, and water. The rapid industrial development is the main cause of increase in concentration of heavy metals and their disposal into the environment. It is important to mention that more than 20 heavy metals are considered lethal, and fifty percent of these are discharged into the environment in a huge quantity and that can pose dire consequences on human health. 1 The numbers of conventional methods have been developed over the last few years for the removal of heavy metals from industrial wastewater. The predominant methods are coagulation and flocculation. 2 Other traditional techniques were used for removal of heavy metal ions from aqueous solutions are chemical precipitation, ion exchange, chemical oxidation/reduction, reverse osmosis, electrodialysis, ultrafiltration, etc. However, these methods have their own limitations such as less efficiency, sensitive operating conditions, production of secondary sludge and also the disposal is a costly affair. 3 The precipitation, ion exchange, electrochemical processes, and membrane technology are well-known chemical methods that are economically not feasible and less competent than the biosorption process. 4 Moreover, these methods create environmental pollution by increasing the pollution load of heavy metals through the disposal of byproduct. 1 The cost-effective and non-conventional adsorbents such as agriculture byproducts such as nutshells, wood, bone, peat coconut shells have converted into activated carbons and biomass like Aspergillus tereus, Rhizopus aehizus. 1,5,6 However, these materials can be used as effective adsorbents for the