Natural hydrated sodium calcium alumino silicate (mesolite) is an important and widespread industrial material of unique chemical structure. This study reports batch adsorption analysis of divalent nickel Ni(II) on mesolite. Removal efficiency of the mesolite was influenced by pH, initial Ni(II) concentration and adsorbent dose. The adsorption of Ni (II) by the mesolite was the highest at pH 7 and using a dosage of 0.05 g. The optimized concentration was 100 ppm. The order of the Ni(II) adsorption and adsorption isotherms were determined by varying parameters such as pH, initial concentration and contact time. Langmuir, Freundlich, Temkin models were applied to adsorption equilibrium data to find the best model. Langmuir model with R2 = 0.99is the best fit for the adsorption data. The kinetics of adsorption followed pseudo first order reversible reaction as well as Intra particle diffusion method. The separation parameter, RL value was less than 1 which indicates that adsorption of Ni(II) on mesolite is favored. Mesolite was characterized by Fourier transform infrared analysis. Scanning electron microscopy and Transmission electron microscopy were used to analyze before and after adsorption. These results show that natural mesolite hold great potential to remove Ni(II) from industrial wastewater.
