Characterization of water adsorption onto carbonaceous materials produced from food wastes

The recycling of organic wastes has become very important and the development of technology for recycling organic wastes needs to sustain industrial development. In this study, techniques for producing carbonaceous materials from organic wastes are described and water adsorption is characterized. The organic wastes used are coffee grounds and oolong tea leaves carbonized at 673 to 1073 K. The iodine adsorption capacity of the carbonaceous materials increased with increased carbonization temperature. The amount of water adsorbed onto the carbonization materials produced from oolong tea leaves at 873 K for 2 h was the highest. The Freundlich constant 1/n and the differential heat of adsorption of the carbonaceous materials produced from oolong tea leaves were greater than that of the carbonaceous materials produced from coffee grounds. The ability to humidity control can be estimated by the difference between the amount of water adsorbed relative pressure 0.90 and that at relative pressure 0.55. The ability to humidity control was the greatest for the carbonaceous materials produced from the oolong tea leaves at 873 K for 2 h and did not depend upon the adsorption temperature. These results indicated that the carbonaceous materials produced from oolong tea leaves at 873 K for 2 h could have more humidity control. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science (USA).