RT journal article
T1 Recycled plastics as innovative low-cost adsorbents to reduce lead concentrations in waters
A1 Lombana, Rachel
A1 Peña Icart, Mirella
A1 Mendiguchía Martínez, Carolina
A2 Química Analítica
K1 Recycled plastics
K1 Metals
K1 PE
K1 PP
K1 Water
K1 Low-cost adsorbent
AB Plastic wastes are an issue of global concern due to their continuous increase and their negative impact in theenvironment, but recycling rates are still low. The search of new uses for recycled plastics could increase theserates extending the product life cycle.Several works have shown the capacity of plastics to adsorb contaminants from the surrounding environment.This capacity could be an advantage to use plastics as innovative and low-cost adsorbents materials in solid phaseextraction systems to reduce the contaminant load in effluents.Then, the aim of this work was to evaluate the use of recycled plastics as low-cost adsorbents to reduce themetals load in effluents. The adsorption capacity of three different recycled plastics, high density polyethylene(HDPE), low density polyethylene (LDPE) and polypropylene (PP), for Pb2+ in water was evaluated. After materialcharacterization, the effect of several parameters on the adsorption efficiency was tested, as sample pH,sorbent dosage, contact time, initial Pb2+ concentration and co-existing metals ions and organic matter. Inaddition, a continuous flow system was also proved, as well as the possibility of reuse the adsorbent severaltimes.The results suggest that recycled plastics, as obtained from the recycling plant, can be a good low-costalternative to reduce the lead concentrations in effluents before they were discharged to the environment,allowing a reduction up to 70 % of lead even when a continuous flow solid phase extraction system is used.Besides, developing countries could take advantage of a widely available and low-cost waste for the treatment oftheir waste waters.
PB Elsevier
SN 1096-0953
YR 2025
FD 2025
LK http://hdl.handle.net/10498/39051
UL http://hdl.handle.net/10498/39051
LA eng
DS Repositorio Institucional de la Universidad de Cádiz
RD 06-nov-2026