THERMAL REGENERATION OF AN ACTIVATED CARBON EXHAUSTED WITH DIFFERENT SUBSTITUTED PHENOLS

The thermal desorption process of phenol, m-aminophenol, p-cresol and p-nitrophenol from an activated carbon has been studied. For this purp ose, the activated carbon-phenolic compound system was heated to 1100 K in a He flow following determination of weight loss and the evolutio n of light gases by a thermobalance and by mass spectrometry, respecti vely. Results showed that during the heat treatment, part of the pheno l evolved from the activated carbon and was deposited at the outlet of the reactor and part underwent degradation reactions to light gases a nd to a residue that remained on the surface of the activated carbon. Finally, the variation of the adsorption capacity of the activated car bon after several adsorption-regeneration cycles has also been studied .