Abstract
Concentration history was studied when aqueous solutions of binary and ternary component systems were fed to the fixed-bed of activated carbon granules. The systems studied were phenol-benzoic acid, benzoic acid-para-nitrophenol and phenol-benzoic acid-para-nitrophenol of several concentration ranges.
Because of different adsorptivity for each component, breakthrough curves observed for less-adsorbable component showed a typical profile consisting of four parts, namely, first adsorption zone, first equilibrium-attained zone, second adsorption zone and second equilibrium-attained zone. More-adsorbable component appeared in the last two zones described above.
These zones, especially the first equilibrium-attained zone and the second adsorption zone, were studied with respect to their lengths and amount adsorbed, based on simple assumptions and the constant-pattern concept.
Furthermore, breakthrough curves were obtained for the ternary system to show that the above discussion is valid for the system.
